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Congressman Mark DeSaulnier is probably the most progressive Representative you never heard of, which is shocking because he began his political career as the Republican Mayor of Concord. DeSaulnier's road to the left is a strange one to say the least. He was a truck driver, probation officer, and hospitality worker, before finally making it big as a restaurateur. The money and popularity of his restaurants fueled DeSaulnier's local political career through the 90s, and when he switched parties he was readily embraced by that Democratic party establishment.

Signs of DeSaulnier's ideological transformation began to appear when he got elected to the California state legislator in 2006. He founded the Ending Poverty and Inequality in California Caucus and championed numerous bills that focused on issues like ending mass incarceration, penalizing large executive salaries, and increasing funding for public housing. After losing a special election for a Congress in 2009, he took another shot in 2014 when his personal friend Rep. George Miller retired from his Bay Area seat. This time, armed with the biggest war chest and a slew of endorsements, DeSaulnier won the race handily. Rather than entering Congress beholden Pelosi and the California establishment that backed his candidacy, DeSaulnier's immediately started voting like Bernie Sanders.

The guy's voting records is practically spotless, meaning we don't like that one time he voted to symbolically condemn the Israeli BDS movement; that is basically it! DeSaulnier cosponsors all the big-ticket progressive priorities, but he also backs less well-known policies that would truly transform our country into a Scandinavian utopia, such as raising the estate tax to 77% and requiring corporations to give a 1/3 of their board seats to workers. For a former business owner whose alleged wealth is north of $80 million, DeSaulnier demonstrates a level of class treason that is inspiring. For either good or ill, DeSaulnier refrains from shouting his leftwing resume from rooftop, opting to instead come across in public as a mild-mannered liberal Democrat.

It is our opinion that politics is inherently transactional, meaning that unless progressives can build and exert electoral power, they can't expect politicians to work in their interest. 95% of the time this is true, but every once in a while you get a gem like Mark DeSaulnier who owes progressives nothing but goes to bat for them every day.