Attorney General Becerra urges Cal grads to fight for change

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra speaks to graduating political science students at Cal on Sunday, May 14, 2017 in Berkeley, CA. California Attorney General Xavier Becerra speaks to graduating political science students at Cal on Sunday, May 14, 2017 in Berkeley, CA. Photo: Paul Kuroda, Special To The Chronicle Buy photo Photo: Paul Kuroda, Special To The Chronicle Image 1 of / 4 Caption Close Attorney General Becerra urges Cal grads to fight for change 1 / 4 Back to Gallery

Speaking to political science graduates at UC Berkeley Sunday, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra voiced the traditional exhortation to go out and change the world.

But the state’s first Latino attorney general, the son of immigrants and the first in his family to graduate from college, urged them to employ a special weapon — ganas, Latino slang that, loosely defined, means desire merged with intestinal fortitude.

Fighting for political change in the current challenging times, he said, won’t be easy.

“We’ve got to do it together,” he said “We’ve got to do it with guts, we’ve got to do it with grit. We’ve got to have ganas. ... Look it up.”

A critic of President Trump, Becerra invoked the words and spirit of Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., a civil rights leader who has engaged in tussles with the president.

“You need to get in the way,” he said. “You need to get into trouble. You need to get into good trouble.”

The graduates cheered, and a few parents undoubtedly winced.

The state attorney general since January, Becerra has pledged to defend California against the Trump administration’s immigration policies, including travel bans and threats to defund sanctuary cities.

He didn’t really talk politics to the students who studied them for four years, or longer, and didn’t directly mention Trump. But he talked about the need to protect “the rule of law.”

Becerra told the students not to forget where they came from and to make sure they include everyone in their battle for political change — even the manual laborers, clerical workers and people just trying to get by.

“It takes everyone,” he said.

He told the story of his immigrant parents — his dad, a ditch-digger, his mother, a typist — meeting President Bill Clinton, and said it was the greatest memory in his 24 years in the House of Representatives.

Becerra spoke of “moments of inflection” — critical times — like the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terror attacks and the recovery after the Wall Street collapse. Fighting to protect everyone’s rights now, he said, is a similar moment.

“You don’t have to do it by yourself,” he said. “You don’t have to have done it before. But when you get out there with the guts and the grit and the ganas, you can make a difference.”

Michael Cabanatuan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mcabanatuan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ctuan