Who is Saikat Chakrabarti, Indian-origin Democrat in fray to succeed Nancy Pelosi?

Nancy Pelosi, one of the most powerful political figures in the United States, has announced she will retire from Congress. The 85-year-old Congresswoman said on Thursday (November 6) that she will not seek re-election to Congress in 2026.

Pelosi’s announcement came two days after voters in California approved “Proposition 50,” a state redistricting effort to help Democrats win five new House seats in next year’s midterm elections.

With Pelosi ending her four-decade career, her congressional seat is up for grabs. Many candidates, including Indian-origin Saikat Chakrabarti, have thrown their hats in the ring.

Let’s take a closer look.

Who is Saikat Chakrabarti?

Saikat Chakrabarti, 39, is a former political adviser who has worked with Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Bernie Sanders.

He was born in an Indian Bengali family in Fort Worth, Texas. Chakrabarti earned a Bachelor’s in computer science from Harvard University in 2007.

Before entering politics, he worked as a founding engineer at financial services company Stripe.

Later, he co-founded the tech startup Mockingbird.

In a video on X, Chakrabarti said he was motivated to shift to San Francisco in 2009 because he had “always been in love with the idea of the city”.

He said he has pursued progressive politics “for the past decade or so”.

Chakrabarti was associated with Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign. He founded a campaign group called ‘Justice Democrats’ in 2017, which “recruited progressive candidates all across the country to run for Congress”.

After working for Sanders’ presidential campaign, Chakrabarti co-founded an organisation called Brand New Congress with the aim of helping hundreds of progressive candidates in congressional races.

He successfully launched Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s congressional campaign for New York. As she headed to Congress, Chakrabarti served as her chief of staff.

Chakrabarti and AOC joined hands in 2019 for the Green New Deal (GND), a proposed framework to adopt drastic measures to cut carbon emissions across the economy, with a goal to create jobs and boost the economy.

To put GND onto the legislative agenda, they held a sit-in alongside climate activists in the office of Nancy Pelosi, who was then the US House Speaker.

Chakrabarti wants to reform Democratic Party

In February, Saikat Chakrabarti had announced he will run for Congress against Nancy Pelosi .

“I really thought after Trump’s second election, the Democrats would have some sort of ‘come to Jesus’ moment,” Chakrabarti told Prospect magazine in September. “I saw none of that. I even saw Nancy Pelosi asked point blank, ‘what did the Democrats do wrong?’ And her answer was basically nothing… I just feel like it’s completely inadequate.”

Now, he is in the race to replace Pelosi in Congress. He said he is running to represent working people and help transform the Democratic Party.

“This is really the chance we have for a movement that really stands for working people,” he said, as per Fox News. 

Last month, in an interview with news outlet Zeteo, Chakrabarti said that he believed Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York has “failed as leader for the Democratic Party” and that he would not back Jeffries if elected to Congress.

Chakrabarti also said he thinks Jeffries “should be primaried.” “I am going to be calling for people to primary all the democrats who have completely failed this party,” he said.

Jeffries is currently the US House Democratic leader.

Sharing a clip of the interview on X, Chakrabarti called for an overall reform of the Democratic Party and wrote, “It’s not just me. Nearly 80 people running for Congress declined to support Jeffries for leader. We need new people to run across the country to completely rebuild this party to be one that can stop an authoritarian coup and build an economy that works for working people.”

Speaking to Prospect, the software engineer said earlier that his goal is to “completely change the brand of the Democratic party”, which faced its lowest favourability ratings ever, according to some recent polls.

“The real battle in Congress right now is not left (versus) right,” Chakrabarti said. “It’s sort of status quo — people who want to keep this old status quo that’s in the pockets of oligarchy, in the pockets of corporations, versus a new movement of people who aren’t taking corporate money and lobbyist money, and who are really working for an economy that works for everybody.”

To replace Pelosi, Chakrabarti first needs to win the Democratic nomination. He will be running from San Francisco in the US Congress, the Californian seat currently occupied by Pelosi.

He is likely to be challenged by California State Senator Scott Wiener, Christine Pelosi, the congresswoman’s daughter, and San Francisco Supervisor Connie Chan.

Polling by GrowSF shows Chakrabarti has “a better shot than any challenger in many years”.

With inputs from agencies