Leilani Dowell is not your typical 26-year-old student at SF State. She is running for Congress against Nancy Pelosi in November 2004, on top of majoring in labor studies and planning to graduate in May. Dowell says the rich have their political candidates but working and poor people need their own too.

"You can't rely on politicians voted into office to represent working people. They didn't come from working class." said Dowell, who is running for office with the Peace and Freedom Party, relatively new to ballots in California.

At her campaign kick off party, which took place on March 8, Dowell announced her plan to run with the Peace and Freedom Party in District 8. She spoke about a number of issues central to the core of her campaign. Dowell supports funding for jobs and education, Affirmative Action and services for undocumented workers, and universal health care. One of the issues taking top priority, however, is Dowell's involvement with the anti-war movement.

"We want to end occupation everywhere," Dowell said, mentioning not only the occupation of Iraq, but U.S. involvement in Haiti, Columbia, Cuba, Iran, the Philippines, Syria and Venezuela.

In addition, Dowell hopes to raise minimum wage, continue to defend a woman's right to have an abortion and support same sex marriages.

"Trying to change takes a movement of people pushing on the streets for their rights," Dowell said, insisting that grassroots mobilizing is what she is trying to encourage, not merely that people vote for her in the upcoming election. Dowell said this campaign is not about winning the vote but spreading the word, organization and activism.

November will be the first time Dowell has run for political office, a move that was prompted 6 months ago by a friend and colleague with the Worker's World Party, a socialist group with whom Dowell is a member.

"I had not done anything in electoral politics," Dowell said, remembering when she was first approached to represent the party and running for Congress in District 8. Dowell figured, why not take the next step in becoming politically active and try something new?

Bill Hackwell, 56, is Dowell's campaign manager. He remembers the first time he worked with her on a project to increase awareness about U.S. military aid to Columbia. "I could tell right away she was the behind the scenes coordinator," Hackwell said. "Like many young people who became politically active after 9/11, she made things logistically come together and was the person who focused on making things successful. The anti-war movement is about the responsibility you take on and what you follow through with," Hackwell said.

Hackwell reinforced a common theme that emerged after talking to several people involved with Dowell's congressional campaign: this campaign is not about any one individual, but about a collective group working to change the nature of society and contemporary politics.

"LeiLani is a remarkable person," Hackwell said, "but it is the concepts she represents that will attract people to this campaign."

The seemingly inborn ability to lead, network and organize, are the qualities that make Dowell shine, were ones she acquired at an early age.

"I was a big nerd as a child," Dowell said. She skipped kindergarten and second grade. "For the most part I kept to myself," she said.

Looking back, Dowell said she rarely saw, let alone knew, anyone who was other than African American or Latino, and didn't have a real conversation about race until she was in 11th grade.

In 12th grade, Dowell took U.S. history, an honors course, which changed her life. "We read, 'A People's History of the United States,' which talked about this country before the colonists came, about immigrants from other countries and about the natives that were here," she said. "That was the first time I knew I wanted to get political."

Since those days Dowell has worked as a pre-school teacher, a union organizer, an office worker and on campaigns. She is a spokesperson for the organization Act Now to Stop War and End Racism (ANSWER.)

"She's had a lot of life experiences and worked at a young age," Hackwell said. "She's the kind of person who rises to the top."

Dwight Simpson, a professor of international relations, has crossed paths with Dowell. "I am not intimately acquainted with LeiLani, but I know her by reputation and I have always admired her. She is highly intelligent and believes in political activism," he said.

Nathalie Alsop, 23, plans to attend SF State in Fall 2004 as a political science major and has worked with Dowell on various campaigns. "She strikes me as a very strong woman, very capable," she says.

Dowell says, thoughtfully, that in 10 years she hopes to be doing exactly what she is doing now: making her mark in politics and organizing in the community.

"I hope our world is in a different place in 10 years, but regardless I'd like to be organizing movements of working people," Dowell said. " I hope my actions inspire people. I hope people are inspired to get involved."