Former presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke talks about Democratic failures, Gaza and youth vote at Philly event

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Former Texas Congressman Beto O’Rourke visited Philadelphia Friday evening, the latest out-of-state Democrat to hold a town hall-style event ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. More than 300 people attended the event where O’Rourke criticized the Trump administration and discussed pressing issues such as voting rights, health care and the war in Gaza.

O’Rourke presented himself as a progressive, applauding leaders such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Bernie Sanders, who he said “was right.”

“Everything he’s been saying for as long as he’s been saying it, it just turns out he was 100% right,” he said.

He called Zohran Mamdani, who recently won the recent Democratic primary for mayor of New York, “one of the most exciting political leaders that I have seen in my life.”

Who is O’Rourke?

A former punk rock bassist and city councilman, O’Rourke, 52, represented El Paso in Congress for six years before rising to national prominence in 2018, when he narrowly lost a U.S. Senate race to Republican incumbent Sen. Ted Cruz in deep-red Texas, running a grassroots campaign that raised record sums through small-dollar donations. He announced his candidacy for the 2020 presidential election, but dropped out before the first primary.

He joins other potential Democratic candidates who have visited Philadelphia recently ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, including Rep. Ro Khanna of California and Sen. Ruben Gallego of Arizona.

2024 and its aftermath

O’Rourke said the Democrats did former President Joe Biden a “disservice by having him go out there and try to save the country a second time from Donald Trump when he was in no position to be able to do that.”

“I sure wish that I had raised my hand and said, ‘Hey, hold on a second, this does not seem right,’” he said.

A member of the audience asked “Why didn’t you?”

O’Rourke said he “listened to those closest to him who said Biden is as sharp as he’s ever been.”

“And do you want to be the person that chips away or damages him if he is hell-bent and intent on running again? Or do you just decide, hey, it looks like this is happening, let’s do everything we can to make it successful with the benefit of hindsight?” he said.

O’Rourke also said that Democrats talked about saving democracy but it was a concept lost on many Americans who felt disenfranchised, citing the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. the Federal Elections Commission, which prohibited limits on independent expenditures by corporations and individuals.

“Is this a democracy where one person named Elon Musk can spend $300 million to purchase the outcome of a presidential election?” he said. “Is this a democracy where political action committees can pour millions of dollars into state house, state senate, U.S. Congressional, U.S. Senate races to purchase the outcomes — the policies that those members of Congress pursue, the future that we build or deny to one another? It sure doesn’t feel like a democracy to me.”

Where Democrats went wrong in wooing young voters

O’Rourke’s visit to the city coincided with the 2025 national convention of the Young Democrats of America held in Philadelphia last week.

At the town hall, University of Pittsburgh student Andrew Wise, who serves as president of the school’s College Democrats, asked how more youth can be motivated to support Democrats.

Although young voters in Pennsylvania and around the country leaned toward Harris in the 2024 election, a greater percentage voted for Trump and Republicans compared to 2020. Citing a recent Yale Youth Poll, Wise noted that voters ages 18 through 21 favor Republicans by almost 12 points.

O’Rouke said that Democrats didn’t do enough to court the youth vote in 2024 and added that some Democrats are now going on Joe Rogan and “calling color commentary at basketball games,” and said that was  “great.” He added that Democrats need to build more direct lines of communication with youth voters.

“I think the answer, and this may be too obvious, is why don’t we follow young leaders like you who are the age of the people that we’re trying to reach,” he told Wise. “You are closest to the people that we are trying to turn out right now. And so part of the reason I asked if I could come to the Young Democrats of America Convention and speak last night and be there for a town hall today, I want to listen and learn about what you’re working on, what you’re doing.”

After the event, Wise said that he appreciated O’Rourke’s comments, and that it conveyed a strong “populist message that resonates with the average American, the type of American that we lost in the past.”

Wise agreed that Democrats should have done more to talk to younger voters like himself, which Trump had done effectively.

“He was on podcasts, podcasts that I listened to personally as a younger white guy,” Wise said. “He got out there and he talked to people and he didn’t say, ‘Oh, this isn’t the traditional media ecosystem.’ We can go out and talk to people on sports podcasts, meet people where they are, and where people are is on their stereo systems in their AirPods every day while they’re getting work done, while they’re going to work. And that’s how you reach people, not going on late night TV, not going on CNN. That stuff doesn’t work anymore.”

He added that Mamdani showed how effective that can be. Mamdani is credited with using social media to fuel his successful primary run.

“Some of us are calling it the new Tea Party movement, but really all I think it is is progressives coming together and uniting as a united front, which Beto talks about,” he said.

U.S. “complicit” in Gaza war

O’Rourke argued that the U.S was complicit in Israel’s war in Gaza.

“The death toll is now over 50,000 people – the vast majority of them completely innocent of any crime or participation in any war or any act of terrorism, of them children,” he said. “And we know all of us here and our fellow Americans, especially young people know clearly what is right and what is wrong. And that is absolutely wrong. And we cannot just blame it on the [Israeli Defense Force] or on [Israeli Prime Minister Bibi] Netanyahu. This is also us. We are the largest donor to the state of Israel.”

The room erupted in applause. However, Philadelphia resident Barry Silber, who is Jewish, said that he was disappointed by the comments.

“Let me be clear: I don’t like Netanyahu. I wish he’d be gone. I want this war to end, but nevertheless, I was appalled by the response when he mentioned Gaza, so I’m disappointed,” he said. “There was no mention of Hamas. There’s no mention of the Uyghurs in concentration camps. No mention of the Syrian Civil War. No mention of what’s going on with the Druze right now. And yet we as a population that make up 0.2% of the Earth’s population, seem to be singled out.”

O’Rouke expressed support for the “uncommitted” movement in the 2024 Michigan Democratic presidential primary, arguing it would put pressure on then-President Biden to bring an end to the Gaza war.

Muffie Silber, one of the townhall attendees, who describes herself as “totally progressive, said that she would consider voting for O’Rourke if he ran for president in 2028.

“I had a lot of admiration for Beto because of the way he ran his campaign, not taking any PAC money, not taking any outside money, and almost winning,” she said. “I think that shows people that it can sort of be done.”