Bernie Sanders and AOC Inject New Anti-Trump Energy Into the Democratic Party

The biggest political rallies anywhere in America right now are being headlined by an 83-year-old senator in the twilight of his career and his 35-year-old protégée.

Roughly 36,000 people in Los Angeles. More than 34,000 attendees in Denver. And another 30,000 on Tuesday night near Sacramento.

Those monster crowds — more than 200,000 people in all, according to organizers — have turned out to cheer on a fiery anti-Trump, anti-billionaire message from Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York during their “Fighting Oligarchy” tour of Western states. Mr. Sanders even surprised attendees at the Coachella music festival near Los Angeles last week, popping onstage to introduce the singer Clairo and make an appeal to young people.

As Democrats search for a spark after being routed in November, the two progressives are providing the kindling, offering the party’s beaten-down base the fighting spirit it has been missing ever since President Trump returned to office.

Even as some top Democrats tack to the center or try to find common ground with the emboldened Republican president, Mr. Sanders and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez dismiss the notion of any concessions. Instead, they have stuck to the simple argument that won over millions during Mr. Sanders’s two runs for president and endeared him to the types of working-class voters who abandoned Democrats in November: The system is broken, with the wealthy enriching themselves while others scrape by.

“All over this country, people are struggling, every single day, just to survive,” Mr. Sanders told the crowd on Tuesday in Folsom, Calif. “Brothers and sisters, in the richest country in the history of the world, we can do a hell of a lot better than that!”