{"id":13926,"date":"2020-02-20T13:42:13","date_gmt":"2020-02-20T21:42:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=13926"},"modified":"2020-02-20T13:42:15","modified_gmt":"2020-02-20T21:42:15","slug":"sanders-revs-up-richmond-crowd-ahead-of-super-tuesday-vote","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2020\/02\/20\/sanders-revs-up-richmond-crowd-ahead-of-super-tuesday-vote\/","title":{"rendered":"Sanders revs up Richmond crowd ahead of Super Tuesday vote"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Erin Allday\u00a0<\/a>Feb. 17, 2020\u00a0(SFChronicle.com)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Democratic
1of14Democratic presidential contender Sen. Bernie Sanders greets a supporter during a campaign appearance in Richmond.Photo: Gabrielle Lurie \/ The Chronicle<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Sen.
2of14Sen. Bernie Sanders and his wife Jane O\u2019Meara Sanders wave to the crowd at the end of his speech at the Craneway Pavilion in Richmond. He is leading in most of the polls going into California\u2019s March 3 primary.Photo: Gabrielle Lurie \/ The Chronicle<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Liza
3of14Liza Bender sports her Bernie Sanders campaign gear playing up the candidate\u2019s glasses and hair.Photo: Gabrielle Lurie \/ The Chronicle<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Two weeks out from Super Tuesday, and with no state more powerfully positioned than California to name the Democratic nominee, Bernie Sanders told an enthusiastic crowd of thousands in Richmond on Monday that victory is riding on their shoulders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe candidate who wins here in California stands a pretty good chance to win the entire nation,\u201d Sanders called out to cheers from his supporters. \u201cSo, today, I\u2019m here to ask you to vote. To vote early. To bring your aunts and uncles and grandparents and friends and co-workers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sanders is leading most of the polls in California and coming off good performances in the first two stops of the primary trail. But the March 3 elections in 14 states are make or break, with a huge number of the delegates needed to decide the Democratic nomination distributed that day. Sanders wedged the Richmond rally, at Craneway Pavilion on the bay, between stops in Carson City, Nev., on Sunday night and Tacoma, Wash., later Monday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The line to get into the Richmond event stretched for nearly a mile one hour before the rally was set to begin at noon, and two hours before Sanders was expected to take the stage. The atmosphere inside and out was excited if not outright festive \u2014 supporters waved blue and white placards, pinned buttons to their shirts and occasionally broke into chants of \u201cBernie! Bernie!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not that often we get a politician coming to Richmond. When we can show our support, we want to be here,\u201d Richmond resident Ted Steen, 29, said as he waited with a friend in the back of the pavilion for the rally to begin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m feeling excited already,\u201d said Joanna Pulido, also of Richmond. \u201cIt\u2019s high energy. This is a good place to be right now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Outside in line, Oakland resident Kenneth Giles, 48, said he\u2019s \u201cnever disliked\u201d Sanders as a candidate, but this rally was his first time getting actively involved in the campaign. He said he is drawn to Sanders\u2019 honesty \u2014 \u201cI think he\u2019s honest, as far as politicians go\u201d \u2014 and his chances of beating President Trump in the November election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe current administration makes me feel like I need to do everything I can. It\u2019s time for a change, and Bernie\u2019s going to be the one to get us there,\u201d Giles said. \u201cThis is history. I can say I\u2019ve been in the same building as the president of the United States. I have total confidence he\u2019ll get the job done.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sanders took the stage at about 1 p.m., after a brief introduction by, and warm hug from, actor and activist Danny Glover, a San Francisco native.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sanders told the crowd his team has two goals: to defeat Trump and to lead a transformational movement to overhaul American institutions that he said favor the rich over the working class and poor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe understand that no president, not Bernie Sanders or anybody else, can do it alone. We need a mass political movement,\u201d Sanders said. \u201cAnd what the establishment is trembling about, what they\u2019re fearful of, is that working people are standing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe one percent is enormously powerful,\u201d Sanders said of the wealthiest individuals in the country. \u201cBut at the end of the day, the one percent is just 1%. If we stand together for an agenda that works for all, nothing will stop us. We\u2019ll defeat Trump, and we\u2019ll transform the country.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sanders\u2019 speech was met with screams of support and applause as he raised familiar, crowd-pleasing notes. Though he broke no new ground with his speech, the audience was loud in its support for affordable health care, free public higher education and the proposed Green New Deal, which calls for aggressive new policies to address climate change and economic inequality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was a good speech, but it seemed a little familiar, like he\u2019s given it a few times,\u201d Sausalito resident Kahlil Gray, 29, said as he made his way through a crowd of supporters eager for a glimpse of Sanders after his speech. \u201cI guess that\u2019s the way things go. And this has been a great experience, right up there with meeting Barack Obama.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many people at the event said they were encouraged to see broad diversity among the supporters in attendance. There were gray-haired men and women in well-worn tie-dyed shirts and scarves and families with young children who brought grapes and reusable water bottles for the hours they\u2019d be waiting. Outside the pavilion, a group of families had set up a table for selling Girl Scout cookies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe went to two rallies in 2016, but they were nothing like this,\u201d said Berkeley resident Jennifer Altman, 47, who attended the Richmond event with her husband and two daughters. \u201cTo see how this movement has grown and to see the diversity \u2014 I think now there is an undeniable shift in support. This is not a white boys club here. There is a preponderance of women and people of color. Bernie Sanders is speaking for us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Erin Allday is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: eallday@sfchronicle.com<\/a> Twitter: @erinallday<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Erin Allday<\/a><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Follow Erin on:https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/SFChronicle\/<\/a>erinallday<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Erin Allday is a health reporter who writes about infectious diseases, stem cells, neuroscience and consumer health topics like fitness and nutrition. She\u2019s been on the health beat since 2006 (minus a nine-month stint covering Mayor Gavin Newsom). Before joining The Chronicle, Erin worked at newspapers all over the Bay Area and covered a little of everything, including business and technology, city government, and education. She was part of a reporting team that won a Polk Award for regional reporting in 2005, for a series of stories on outsourcing jobs from Santa Rosa to Penang, Malaysia. Erin started her journalism career at the Daily Californian student newspaper and many years later still calls Berkeley her home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u00a92020 Hearst<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Erin Allday\u00a0Feb. 17, 2020\u00a0(SFChronicle.com) Two weeks out from Super Tuesday, and with no state more powerfully positioned than California to name the Democratic nominee, Bernie Sanders told an enthusiastic crowd of thousands in Richmond on Monday that victory is riding on their shoulders. \u201cThe candidate who wins here in California… Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13926"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13926"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13926\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13927,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13926\/revisions\/13927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}