A Tale of Two Labor Candidates in the East Bay
An East Bay, California, state senate race is between two candidates with past Bernie Sanders endorsements: one with Democratic Socialists of America support who refuses corporate cash, the other who accepts such money.
Vice Mayor Jovanka Beckles speaking with supporters during a recess at the Richmond City Council meeting in Richmond, California, on July 15, 2014. (Carlos Avila Gonzalez / the San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)
In late October, 2018, East Bay Democratic Socialists of America (EBDSA) members and other progressives organized a preelection rally at a Berkeley High School auditorium. A wildly cheering crowd of several thousand came to hear Senator Bernie Sanders and Congresswoman Barbara Lee. Welcoming everyone to the event was thirty-four-year old Jesse Arreguín, who was backed by Sanders when he ran for mayor of Berkeley two years before.
On the platform with them was Jovanka Beckles, a former Richmond City Council member then running — with backing from DSA, Sanders, and Lee — for a state assembly seat against a corporate Democrat named Buffy Wicks. As the San Francisco Bayview reported, Arreguín’s “repeated mention of Jovanka’s name evoked prolonged chants and a standing ovation for JO-VAN-KA!”
When the two appear on stage again this fall, Arreguín won’t be leading cheers for Beckles. That’s because they are now competing to represent Senate District 7 (SD-7), covering 850,000 residents of Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, and smaller East Bay communities.
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