SANTA CLARA — Ro Khanna had a message for the nearly 200 supporters who came out Saturday morning to cheer on the congressional candidate: “I will keep running.”
For the third time, Khanna has launched a campaign to run for the U.S. House of Representatives, positioning himself as the tech-savvy, youth-friendly, grass-roots candidate. Back in 2004, he lost the Democratic primary to then-Rep. Tom Lantos. Now he’s trying for the second time to oust Rep. Mike Honda from his longtime seat in the17th Congressional District, which includes Silicon Valley. Khanna lost last year’s race to Honda — who is now serving his eighth House term — by 3.6 percentage points after a long and often ugly campaign in which the candidates seemed to spend more time nitpicking each other’s faults than debating policy issues.
On Saturday, he portrayed the bitter 2014 race as a warm-up for 2016, when he will have the benefit of the presidential election that is expected to motivate a wave of new voters to turn out at the polls.
“No one knew who I was” last year, Khanna said in an interview. “Now we’re starting with a strong turnout. We have momentum.”
Khanna, 38, of Fremont, is relying on those independent voters in their 20s and 30s who are expected to turn out in 2016 to more than make up the 3.6 percentage points that marked his defeat. “That’s our natural base,” Khanna said. “We won those voters over last time.”
But Khanna’s battle will be an uphill one: Honda, 73, who has strong ties to labor unions and political PACs, is pledging to stay in office. He’s been in public office since he was elected to the San Jose Unified School District board in 1981.
Khanna vowed Saturday that we would not take any money from lobbyists or PACs: “It’s going to be tougher,” he admitted, “but I am confident we will have the resources to get the job done.”
Khanna raised $801,000 in the first quarter this year, mostly after C-SPAN aired footage of Honda seeming to doze off during a Feb. 27 House floor debate on homeland security funding, while Honda raised $258,000. Honda’s snooze became the butt of many jokes during the event and mobilized voters who said they were fed up with the incumbent.
“I’ve been looking for someone who was not Mike Honda for a very long time,” said Mary S. Morris, a Democratic voter from San Jose’s Berryessa area. “People who fall asleep on the job need to not have that job anymore. It’s not about his age, it’s about his capabilities, and I don’t think he has those capabilities anymore.”
Honda fired an early shot across Khanna’s bow last week by launching a website called RosUsualSuspects.com that attacks Khanna for taking contributions and other support from certain people. Those include Texas hedge fund billionaire John Arnold and Florida hedge fund millionaire Marc Leder — both of whom have contributed to many prominent Democrats — and Republican former Rep. Ernie Konnyu, who tried in vain to rally tea party support for Khanna in 2014.
The site also implies Khanna shares some of these donors’ stances on privatizing Social Security, offshoring U.S. jobs and opposing minimum-wage increases, though Khanna repeatedly has spoken to the contrary. Khanna on Thursday had said this underscores the need for new blood in the House: “This is what people do in Washington — they try to score political points with dubious guilt-by-association tactics, rather than working together to get things done.”
Khanna this time around is positioning himself as a community activist who isn’t afraid to get his hands dirty, touting the local work he’s been doing in recent months, such as working with San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo on the city’s manufacturing initiative; standing with Santa Clara residents to urge the City Council to ask the San Francisco 49ers to pay fair market value on the parks and soccer fields around Levi’s Stadium; and working with Milpitas Mayor Jose Esteves to find a solution to the Newby Landfill’s odor issue.
But at the same time Khanna is touting his community activism and middle-class roots, he is also relying on his ties with the tech community and the Silicon Valley elite. On Saturday he said he had support from tech investors Marc Andreessen and Ron Conway. In 2014, Khanna was endorsed by Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt and Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg.
His tech focus has struck a chord with Bay Area youth, who accounted for at least a quarter of the crowd that gathered at the Santa Clara Civic Center on Saturday. A group of high school freshmen and sophomores from Irvington High School in Fremont showed up to cheer the candidate.
“We believe in a lot of Ro’s ideas about bringing STEM education into schools,” said Rohan Hajela, 15. Added 15-year-old Sampreeth Moturi: “Even if we can’t vote, we still have a voice.”
Contact Heather Somerville at 510-208-6413. Follow her at Twitter.com/heathersomervil
