× Expand Mckayla Wilkes for Congress Twenty-eight-year-old Mckayla Wilkes is running against one of the most entrenched Democrats in Congress.

In Maryland, a twenty-eight-year-old black woman who spent much of her youth in and out of juvenile detention is running to challenge one of the most entrenched Democrats in Congress: House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer.

Hoyer has represented Maryland’s Fifth District, which leans thirteen points in favor of Democrats, since 1980. But he’s faced recent criticism from progressives for his opposition to a Medicare-for-All plan, and made headlines in April 2018 when a recording leaked of him pressuring a progressive congressional candidate to drop out of a Colorado Democratic primary.

Mckayla Wilkes filed to challenge him shortly after Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s historic election to Congress in 2018.

“What inspired me to run is my life experiences and how the government didn’t necessarily work for all demographics of people,” she tells The Progressive.

Though the 2020 Democratic primaries are still months out, several women candidates have already emerged as buzz-worthy progressive challengers to long-time, often unopposed Democratic incumbents. Just as the 2018 Congressional election cycle was dubbed a historic “year of the woman,” 2020 is on track to see a similar surge.

Last year, Democrats picked up forty seats in the House—their most successful cycle since 1974. One-hundred two Congresswomen were elected, beating the previous record of eighty-five. And among those elected were progressives including the youngest women, the first Native American women, and the first Muslim women ever elected to Congress.

“I too have tried to sustain a life with children on pay of $7.25 an hour.”

Wilkes’s platform includes support for progressive plans like Medicare-for-All and the Green New Deal. And she is refusing to accept corporate donations that have filled Hoyer’s campaign chests for years.

But part of her appeal is being of the people, not the political class. Wilkes openly discusses her troubled teen years, and the challenges she faces raising two children while attending college courses and working as an administrative assistant.

“I too have tried to sustain a life with children on pay of $7.25 an hour,” she says.

The candidate hopes such experiences will resonate with voters.

“I see throughout my entire district that affordable housing is pretty much a myth,” she says. “Shelters are not accessible, people are struggling with health care, we’re about to have five power plants built in or around the district. Hoyer has said nothing about it and the community it’s going to be built in is about 70 percent African American.”

In Massachusetts, former Wall Street regulator and immigrant from Morocco Ihssane Leckey just launched her campaign to take on a Kennedy.

Democrat Joseph Kennedy III has represented the Massachusetts Fourth District since 2012, and faced no Republican opponent in his 2018 and 2014 re-elections. The grandson of former U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, his namesake legacy has made him a favorite among Democratic donors. His grandmother Ethel Kennedy has hosted $38,000-ticket fundraisers for his campaigns. His corporate donors include Bank of America, Bain Capital, Merrill Lynch, oil and gas exploration company Global Petroleum, weapons manufacturer Raytheon, and Citigroup.

Immigrant from Morocco Ihssane Leckey just launched her campaign to take on a Kennedy.

“During the 2008 economic crisis, I saw people losing their homes and jobs. My classmates weren’t able to pay their tuition anymore and were drowning in student debt,” Leckey tells The Progressive. “That compelled me to regulate the big banks, but it still wasn’t enough.”

After the hearings for Supreme Court appointee Brett Kavanaugh—which many felt represented the worst impulses of the Trump era—Leckey resigned from her position as a special examiner at the Federal Reserve to run for Congress. She supports a Green New Deal, universal childcare, free college tuition, and Medicare-for-All.

“When I was in a car accident,” she says, “the first thing I said was please don’t call an ambulance because I worried about deportation and hospital bills I wouldn’t be able to afford.”

She believes that Kennedy has repeatedly lagged behind on progressive issues.

“Activists like me have had our bitter share of spending hours that should be with our families at the incumbent’s office to push them to sign onto Medicare-for-All or the Green New Deal,” Leckey says. “It takes personal life experience for a leader to bring solutions to the table that are measurable to the problem, bold, and not making concessions with Trump Republicans or corporate and pharma lobbyists to write our legislation.”

Environmental activist and clean technology investor Zina Spezakis felt compelled to run for Congress after seeing her representative in New Jersey’s Ninth District, Bill Pascrell, fail to act with urgency on climate change.

“I have a graduate degree in climate science from Johns Hopkins and I know every single climate model I’ve examined really overestimates the time we have to react,” Spezakis says. “When I see my Representative’s voting record, he’s been a solid blue Democrat but has not shown any leadership in climate policy or addressing it quickly.”

New Jersey candidate Zina Spezakis and her children.

The district favors Democrats by sixteen points; Pascrell’s only formidable opposition during his time in Congress since 1997 has been from primary challengers.

Spezakis also cites Pascrell’s refusal to support Medicare-for-All and donor history of pharmaceutical and health insurance corporations as an example corporate influence on lawmaking.

“This really needs to stop,” she adds. “We’re basically walking blindfolded toward the edge of a cliff on a lot of these issues, whether its climate or health care, criminal justice reform, and campaign finance.”

It will be up to voters to decide whether to elect Wilkes, Leckey, and Spezakis in 2020. But their strategy is already moving the needle. Shortly after Spezakis filed to run against him, Pascrell announced his support for the Green New Deal.