Our Revolution is a left-of-center advocacy group that was formed after Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) 2016 presidential campaign. The group was originally created to support Sen. Sanders and other Democratic Party candidates while advocating for policies such as the Green New Deal and universal government-funded health care under the “Medicare for All” branding. The group claims to have evolved, following Sen. Sanders’s loss in the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries, into a “pragmatic progressive” organization. ¹ Our Revolution has supported a petition opposing the use of emissions free nuclear energy. ²

After the 2024 election of President Donald Trump, Our Revolution launched a series of rallies across the country featuring Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) that advocated against policies set by the second Trump Administration as well as criticizing members of the Democratic Party including Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY). ³

Background

2016 Presidential Election

Following Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-VT) loss in the 2016 Democratic primaries, he founded Our Revolution to support the election of left-of-center “progressives” and to set the groundwork for a potential 2020 presidential run. It raised more than $1.3 million between its August inception and Election Day, 2016. ⁴

In 2019, Sen. Sanders publicly acknowledged that female staffers and volunteers on his 2016 campaign had been subject to harassment by male supervisors and apologized for their treatment. ⁵

Post-2016 Presidential Election

In June 2017, former Ohio State Senator Nina Turner (D-Cleveland) was appointed to the position of president, stating in an interview to The Progressive magazine that her job and that of the organization would be centered on “pushing the Democrats back to where they should be.” ⁶

In 2018, only 27 percent of Our Revolution’s endorsed candidates and ballot measures were successful, compared to 50 percent in 2016. ⁷

2020 Presidential Election

Our Revolution supported Sen. Sanders’s unsuccessful campaign for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination. ⁸ The Wall Street Journal reported that “more than 60,000 people attended more than 4,700 house parties and other events as part of his April 27 ‘organizing kickoff…[with] parties hosted and advertised by Our Revolution chapters.” ⁸ However, Sen. Sanders ended his campaign in April 2020, conceding the nomination to then-former Vice President Joe Biden. ⁹

Post-2020 Presidential Election

Following Sen. Sanders’s defeat in the 2020 Democratic primaries, Our Revolution shifted its focus away from supporting a future Sanders presidential campaign. ¹⁰ It ended its public support for several of the policies he had supported including the Green New Deal and “Medicare for All,” while advocating for more “pragmatic progressive” advocacy which aligned more with the Biden administration. ¹

In the 2024 election, Our Revolution made 10 endorsements for notable municipal, state and federal elections. Of its endorsed candidates, three – Kansas City Councilman Johnathan Duncan, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson (D), and U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) won their elections. Four of Our Revolution’s endorsed candidates lost in their Democratic primary elections to more centrist Democratic candidates. ¹¹

Our Revolution also took positions on seven statewide ballot measures in 2024 elections, succeeding in three of them. ¹¹

Second Trump Administration

After the 2024 election of President Donald Trump, Our Revolution launched a series of “Fighting Oligarchy” rallies across the country featuring Sen. Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) along with various entertainers and elected officials. ^{12 13} The Nation commentator Alex Thomas claimed Sen. Sanders and Rep. Ocasio-Cortez were “starting a new political movement before our eyes.” ¹⁴

Sen. Sanders and Rep. Ocasio-Cortez advocated against policies set by the second Trump Administration and criticized members of the Democratic Party including Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY). ¹⁵

During a June 2025 meeting of “moderate” Democrats in Washington D.C called “WelcomeFest,” speaker Lanae Erickson, the Senior Vice President for Social Policy, Education & Politics for Third Way, criticized activist groups such as Our Revolution and Justice Democrats for “damaging” the “national Democratic brand.” ^{16 17}

In June 2025, Our Revolution participated in organizing or supporting protests branded under the “#NoKings” banner, a national day of demonstrations positioned as a defense of democratic norms against President Donald Trump. These events were part of a larger mobilization involving over 70 Democratic Party affiliates and allied organizations across at least 19 U.S. states and multiple international locations, according to publicly available event listings on Mobilize.us, a Democratic Party-aligned organizing platform. ^{18 19}

Controversies

Nina Turner Leadership

Nina Turner, a former Democratic member of the Ohio State Senate, became president of Our Revolution in 2017, replacing Sanders 2016 presidential campaign manager Jeff Weaver. ²⁰  Several Democratic activists accused Turner of using her role for self-gain instead of addressing the organization’s needs. ²¹

Turner resigned her role at Our Revolution in 2019 to lead Sanders’ unsuccessful 2020 presidential campaign. She was replaced by Joseph Geevarghese, who had previously been executive director of the labor union-funded left-of-center advocacy group Good Jobs Nation. ²²

Turner would go on to run for Congress in Ohio in 2022, losing the Democratic primary to Rep. Shontel Brown (D-OH) by a 67-33 percent margin. ²³

Tezlyn Figaro

In 2018, then-Our Revolution president Nina Turner hired Democratic operative Tezlyn Figaro to be the organization’s director of outreach. Figaro had been the 2016 Sanders campaign’s National Racial Justice Director. ²⁴

Turner terminated Figaro in 2018 after she was discovered to have publicly supported several of then-President Donald Trump’s immigration policies. ²⁵ Cramer, Ruby. “An Our Revolution Staffer Fired For “Anti-Immigrant” Remarks Is Suing The Pro-Bernie Group For Racial Discrimination.” BuzzFeed News. May 17, 2019. Accessed May 30, 2019. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/rubycramer/bernie-sanders-our-revolution-suit.[/note]

After she was fired, Figaro sued Our Revolution over claims of racial discrimination and that it was “retaliation for complaining about the organization’s treatment towards her and African-Americans.” ²⁶ Our Revolution and Figaro settled the lawsuit in 2019 for an undisclosed sum. ²⁷

The incident also led to multiple staff and board resignations including Catalina Velasquez, an undocumented immigrant and transgender activist who had been one of Our Revolution’s founding board members. ²⁸

Opposition to Nuclear Energy

Our Revolution was one of more than 650 signatories on an August 2022 letter organized by People vs Fossil Fuels and addressed to the “Democratic Leadership” in Congress. The letter was titled: “Opposition to Fossil Fuel Project Approvals and Permitting Reforms Conditioned on the Inflation Reduction Act.” ²

The letter portrayed as “false solutions” carbon sequestration, carbon-free nuclear energy and all sources of energy not approved as “renewable” by the signatories: “Relying only on large scale investments in renewable energy and environmental justice alone will not stave off climate disaster if Congress simultaneously puts its legislative foot on the gas to expand fossil fuel production and false solutions like carbon capture, hydrogen, biomass, biofuels, factory farm gas, and nuclear power.” ²

Nuclear power plants produce no carbon dioxide or other greenhouse gas emissions, and as of 2021 accounted for 20 percent of American electricity production—the largest source of zero carbon electricity in the United States. ²⁹ An October 2018 proposal from The Nature Conservancy noted that zero-carbon nuclear plants produced 7.8 percent of total world energy output and recommended reducing carbon emissions by increasing nuclear capacity to 33 percent of total world energy output. ³⁰

Leadership

As of 2023, Our Revolution’s board of directors included Our Revolution executive director Joseph Geevarghese. ³¹ Geevarghese, was previously executive director of the labor union-funded left-of-center advocacy group Good Jobs Nation. ²²

Larry Cohen is chair of the board of directors and the former president of the Communications Workers of America (CWA). ³²

Deborah Parker is the board’s vice chair, a political activist, and founder of Indigenous Women Rise. ³³

Other board members include Jane Kleeb, chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party and a political strategist; ³⁴ Jim Hightower, political activist and former Texas Agriculture Commissioner; ³⁵ Jorden Giger, the co-founder of the Black Lives Matter affiliate in South Bend, Indiana and an unsuccessful candidate for South Bend City Council in 2023; ³⁶ Eileen. “Jordan Giger for City Council in South Bend.” Our Revolution, December 1, 2023. https://ourrevolution.com/jordan-giger-for-city-council-in-south-bend/.[/note] Richard Rodriguez, an Illinois-based political consultant; ³⁷ and Keith Ellison, the Attorney General of Minnesota, a former U.S. Representative from Minnesota, and the former vice chair of the Democratic National Committee. ³⁸

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