Liberal social media sensation Kat Abughazaleh announces run for Congress

In what whitethorn beryllium the archetypal run announcement successful U.S. past ever to usage the F-word, the progressive societal media sensation Kat Abughazaleh released a video Monday that kicked disconnected her bid to unseat Democratic Rep. Jan Schakowsky of Illinois.

“Donald Trump and Elon Musk are dismantling our state portion by piece, and truthful galore Democrats look contented to conscionable beryllium backmost and fto them,” Abughazaleh says successful the video. “So I accidental it’s clip to driblet the excuses and turn a f***ing spine.”

After graduating from George Washington University successful Washington, D.C., with a grade successful planetary security, Abughazaleh, 26, took a occupation with the left-leaning watchdog radical Media Matters earlier being hired by Mother Jones successful 2024. She is champion known for videos successful which she derides Fox News and blimpish personalities. On TikTok, she has implicit 217,000 followers, and astir 200,000 much connected X, and immoderate of her videos person received much than 1 cardinal views.

“I’ve spent my full vocation reporting connected the acold close and being attacked by them arsenic a result,” Abughazaleh said successful her run video, successful which a kaffiyeh, the accepted headdress worn by Middle Eastern men that has go a awesome of Palestinian identity, is seen hanging connected a wall.

Background

The girl of a Palestinian migrant begetter and a seventh-generation Texan mother, Abughazaleh grew up successful an upper-middle-class conception of Dallas, HuffPost reported. Both her parents were politically blimpish Fox News viewers.

When she moved to Tucson, Ariz., arsenic a teenager, however, her position connected the satellite began to shift.

“At slightest fractional my precocious schoolhouse was low-income oregon undocumented,” she told HuffPost. “The bootstrap story conscionable shattered earlier my eyes.”

‘A practice problem’

On her recently minted website, Abughazaleh declares that Democrats “have a practice problem. As in, astir fractional of Congress are millionaires and radical calved earlier the satellite landing.”

“I'm a renter. I don't person wellness insurance,” she adds. “My nett worthy is beauteous overmuch conscionable the laptop I bought with my full severance erstwhile I got laid off... and my adorable feline Heater.”

While Schakowsky, 80, was calved earlier the satellite landing, and arsenic of 2018, she didn’t suffice arsenic a millionaire, according to Open Secrets. Her nett worthy was past estimated astatine $749,017.

Schakowsky has been an outspoken professional of Trump. She boycotted his code to Congress earlier this month, past slammed his remarks arsenic “insulting and disrespectful.”

Last week, Schakowsky joined Rep. Jerry Nadler of New York successful denouncing Trump’s firing of 2 Democratic commissioners astatine the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, calling it “yet different nonstop battle connected our democracy.”

Staunchly wide platform

Abughazaleh is attempting to pat into rising Democratic choler astatine old-guard politicians similar Sen. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, whom progressives impeach of failing to efficaciously antagonistic Trump’s moves to dismantle authorities agencies and occurrence national workers.

On her website, Abughazaleh besides takes a not-so-subtle changeable astatine Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, whose caller podcast has featured guests similar the arch-conservatives Steve Bannon and Charlie Kirk.

“Some Democrats mightiness beryllium blessed to propulsion trans radical nether the autobus for an interrogation with Steve Bannon, but I’m not,” she states.

Her argumentation proposals scope from enacting much protections for LGBTQ+ Americans, passing the Green New Deal to code clime change, expanding wage for nationalist schoolhouse teachers, offering cosmopolitan pre-K, expanding Social Security and abolishing limitations connected abortion.

While Illinois’ Ninth District is considered powerfully Democratic, the archetypal question Abughazaleh indispensable reply is whether she tin statement and bushed Schakowsky, who was archetypal elected to Congress successful 1999, successful the primary.

Schakowsky, aft all, tin thin connected her ain wide record. According to Progressive Punch, a database ranking however members vote, she was rated arsenic the 27th astir progressive Democrat successful Congress. A erstwhile simple schoolhouse teacher, she besides has received an A people from the National Educational Association.

Abughazaleh volition person to person Illinois voters that Schakowsky is portion of the larger occupation progressives spot with the Democratic Party. In her kickoff video, the pistillate known connected societal media arsenic Kat Abu puts it this way: “We’re focused connected gathering constituent needs with 1 elemental rule: What if we didn’t suck?”