Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA) is headed for a competitive primary election next year after his former congressional staffer Jake Rakov launched a primary challenge on Wednesday.

“I’m running for Congress against my former boss who’s been in office for nearly 30 years,” Rakov, 37, said on social media. “It’s time for a new generation of Democrats to step up. We can’t keep sending the same people to DC and expecting things to change.”

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Sherman, 70, has served in Congress since 1997 and represents California’s 32nd Congressional District in the western San Fernando Valley area.

The primary announcement fits with an emerging theme of the 2026 midterm elections that young Democrats want their party to do more. Some, like Rakov, are launching primary challenges to established candidates to push for Democrats to fight harder. 

“I was in his office at the beginning of Trump’s first term, and unfortunately the congressman is still using the same outdated approach that didn’t work back then,” Rakov wrote on his website. “I’m running against my former boss because we need a new generation of Democrats in Washington if we want anything to change.”

Rakov, who has worked in politics for a decade for liberal and Democratic causes, claimed Sherman has not held a town hall in his district in five years.

He promised three commitments in his campaign video: term limits, no corporate Political Action Committee money, and holding town halls in the district every month. 

“Let’s fight fire with fire,” Rakov closed in his campaign announcement video.

Primaries are not uncommon for both political parties as an election cycle approaches and can indicate a sea change in politics. A wave of establishment Republicans was ousted in the 2010s during the Tea Party movement as voters were frustrated by Washington not doing enough on fiscal troubles or reducing the federal government’s reach.

Since President Donald Trump retook the White House in January, grassroots activism has been growing on the Left as Democrats have been raising the alarm bells over a constitutional crisis they say the president is fueling.

“Primaries happen each and every cycle,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) said at a press conference Wednesday in downplaying the Sherman challenge. “I had a primary from the hard left in 2022. My response to that was, ‘Come on in, the water is warm.'”

“It’s a democracy, and the American people will ultimately decide these things in congressional district after congressional district after congressional district,” he continued.

Rakov is not the first young Democrat to announce a primary race against an incumbent. Saikat Chakrabarti, 39, the former chief of staff to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), is primarying former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). Influencer and former liberal watchdog group staffer Kat Abughazaleh, 26, announced her candidacy against incumbent Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) last month.

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Abughazaleh argued that her party needs to “grow a f****** spine.” 

The Washington Examiner contacted Rakov and Sherman but did not receive comments.