San Francisco ready for change — Pelosi’s – Latest News
San Francisco has been more optimistic in recent times, with Mayor Daniel Lurie adopting a more pragmatic method, and voters staging profitable recollects of probably the most radical and harmful native elected officers.
But the race to switch retiring Rep. Nancy Pelosi reveals that outdated habits are arduous to interrupt.
Three viable candidates dominate, offering voters the thrilling phantasm of selection, whereas delivering few new concepts on the problems that really matter to on a regular basis San Franciscans — continued sky-high prices, avenue drug use, punishing taxes, and ideological purity assessments.
Nancy Pelosi speaks at a “Get Out the Vote” rally on May 29, 2026 in San Francisco. Getty Images
Scott Wiener leads the pack as the present state senator {and professional} LGBTQ+ cheerleader. He’s authored a pile of state housing payments that generated spectacular press releases.
Actual properties accomplished? That’s a slower burn, due to the same old California cocktail of charges, lawsuits, and mandates.
Wiener’s actual ardour stays cultural: sanctuary insurance policies for transgender minors fleeing parental skepticism (SB 107), and a memorable pivot declaring Israel guilty of “genocide” after initially sounding more balanced.
Moderates within the metropolis grumble that he’s too busy pandering to national activists on social media to repair the fundamentals. But in San Francisco, that’s typically a characteristic, not a bug.
Scott Wiener holds a commanding lead in current opinion polls. Getty Images for Economic Security Project, Inc.
Connie Chan, present Board of Supervisors member and the proud Pelosi endorsee, brings genuine native taste as a Chinese-American immigrant who really balances budgets and doles out immigrant providers.
She’s competent on the city-county grind — income reserves, union offers, sponsored housing
— but fairly obscure on national or world affairs.
On Israel, she’s all-in on the “genocide” label and one thing referred to as the Block the Bombs Act, as a result of why not import campus protest slogans into congressional coverage?
Chan’s pitch is easy: constantly blame Trump and produce Washington more of the identical metropolis council-style progressivism that’s made San Francisco so notorious.
Connie Chan speaks to volunteers during a canvassing occasion in assist of the Overpaid CEO Act in San Francisco. Bloomberg by way of Getty Images
Saikat Chakrabarti is the flashy outsider centimillionaire socialist — yes, actually. A former Stripe engineer, he’s dumped about $10 million of his own money into the race whereas railing towards the wealthy and company greed.
He’s the co-founder of the Justice Democrats, who spawned the “Squad”; he’s additionally Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s former chief of employees. It’s no shock, then, that he’s endorsed by the Squad’s Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar (plus skilled streamer Hasan Piker),
Chakrabarti is the slick fast-talker who emphatically needs to burn down the Democratic Party and rebuild it in his image: Green New Deal on steroids, wealth taxes, and maximalist international coverage lectures. The irony of a centimillionaire tech bro enjoying revolutionary is misplaced on no one besides his largest donors.
Saikat Chakrabarti debates Scott Wiener and Connie Chan for San Francisco’s Congressional District 11 seat on the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco. San Francisco Chronicle by way of Getty Images
Rounding out the sector is Marie Hurabiell, the late-entering former Republican-turned-“common-sense Democrat.” She’s the uncommon voice pushing precise accountability on crime, benefit in training, and pragmatism in housing with out the ritualistic genuflection to each activist demand.
She has a loyal area of interest — particularly amongst fed-up Asian-American households and small business house owners — however she’s affected by single-digit polling.
Here’s the reality San Francisco voters refuse to confess: there’s painfully little sensible distinction between the three viable leftist candidates. Wiener, Chan, and Chakrabarti all worship on the altar of expansive social spending; ironclad sanctuary insurance policies that prioritize unlawful immigrants over public order; and a heavy give attention to international coverage that treats Israel because the villain whereas Hamas will get a nuanced learn. And, of course, “ICE out.”
They quibble over housing ways — streamlining permits vs. offering subsidies — however none will critically problem the regulatory stranglehold that holds back the creation of new properties people can afford, and need to buy.
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All three will ship outrage towards Trump, demand more funding for the homelessness-industrial complicated, and carry out cultural signaling on gender and id that alienates anybody nonetheless clinging to organic actuality or parental authority.
The actual debate is stylistic: legislative insider (Wiener), neighborhood progressive (Chan), or self-funded national disruptor (Chakrabarti). Voters get the identical governance, both means.
This Tuesday’s main is much less a daring course correction than a referendum on what taste San Francisco prefers for its its outdated, radical id: legislative workhorse, native allure, or revolutionary cosplay.
In a metropolis that ousts prosecutors and college board commissioners when the ache will get dangerous enough, we’ve to marvel how long the voters can keep pretending the variations between candidates like these more than the dangerous outcomes of the insurance policies all of them embrace.
Filling Nancy Pelosi’s seat is all the time going to be unattainable for mortals. She’s commanded worry and respect throughout the aisle; these congressional candidates will principally command consideration from area of interest social media circles and native curiosity teams.
The winner — possible Wiener over the Chan/Chakrabarti runoff survivor — will enter Congress as simply one other safe-seat Democrat shouting into the void, relatively than a voice for the winds of change blowing by San Francisco.
Richie Greenberg is a political commentator primarily based in San Francisco.
