Meet the man who wants to forcibly retire House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in November

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has continuously served in Congress for more than 30 years since first winning a special election in 1987, but if her 2020 general election challenger Shahid Buttar has his druthers, the long-serving Democratic congresswoman will not remain in office much longer.

Buttar is running as a Democrat in his bid to unseat Pelosi, though a sign-up form prominently placed on the homepage of his website describes him as a Democratic Socialist.

During an interview on the John Solomon Reports podcast, the candidate said that he is running to Pelosi's left on some issues, and her right on others.

"I'm frankly running on all sides of Nancy Pelosi. She's such a partisan without principle that it's actually possible to run to her left and right at the same time," Buttar said.

"You know I'm running to her right you might say on issues that relate to, for instance, individual privacy in the face of a government mass surveillance regime she's thoroughly complicit in — or international human rights that have been offended, the CIA torture that she's helped cover up for over ten years. And I'm also running to her left by, for instance, promoting and proposing universal healthcare," he explained.

"I'm also running to her left on issues like climate justice. I'm very eager to see us protect the future, especially by investing substantial public resources in building a green economy that won't kill everyone's grandkids," Buttar noted.

"Another issue that I'd say is both the left and the right at the same time of Nancy Pelosi is removing cannabis from the Controlled Substances Act," he said.

Buttar, an immigrant and a Stanford Law School graduate whose family came to America when he was just 2 years old, previously ran during the 2018 primary but did not advance to face off against Pelosi during the general election. But this year Buttar will compete against the Speaker in an attempt to secure her seat in California's 12th Congressional District.

"And as an immigrant constitutional lawyer, I take the defense of our republic very seriously, it's why I'm running for Congress because I recognize that the Constitution and we the people need policy makers who understand the Constitution well enough to defend it when it's implicated," he said. 

"And having seen Nancy Pelosi serve as an architect of mass surveillance, as an architect of mass incarceration, as a cheerleader for wars for profit and executive secrets, keeping any number of crimes behind a veil that the public can't see, all of those things sort of frankly forced my hand ... somebody needs to take Nancy Pelosi out of Congress and I'm happy to do it," Buttar said.