El Paso, Texas (CNN) Blocks from the Mexican border, Beto O'Rourke on Saturday cast the United States as being on the brink of becoming a "democracy in name only" and his hometown as an example of the nation's way forward.

"This extraordinary, unprecedented concentration of wealth and power and privilege must be broken apart, and opportunity must be shared with all," he said Saturday morning in the first large rally of his presidential campaign.

Speaking Spanish, he said he would fight for a country in which gender, ethnicity and a family's time in the United States are not barriers to voting and economic participation.

The former Texas congressman launched his bid for the 2020 Democratic nomination two weeks ago. Back in his home state after a tour of the early-voting states and the upper Midwest, O'Rourke held his first large public rallies Saturday -- starting in El Paso, where police said a crowd of 1,000 to 2,000 had gathered, with thousands more expected in Houston and Austin later in the day.

Saturday's first event was billed by his campaign as its official kickoff, with more than 1,000 launch parties planned across the country.

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