The NPR Politics Podcast - Tejano Votes And A Competitive Texas Congressional Race

Episode Date: April 23, 2024

Texas's 15th Congressional District is held by Rep. Monica De La Cruz, a Republican. Her Democratic challenger is Michelle Vallejo. Organizers from both parties believe they've got the right message to win the district's Tejano voters.This episode: senior White House correspondent Tamara Keith, congressional correspondent Claudia Grisales, and national political correspondent Mara Liasson.This podcast was produced by Kelli Wessinger and Casey Morell. Our editor is Eric McDaniel. Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi. Listen to every episode of the NPR Politics Podcast sponsor-free, unlock access to bonus episodes with more from the NPR Politics team, and support public media when you sign up for The NPR Politics Podcast+ at plus.npr.org/politics.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hi, this is Sonia, Will, Nathan, Sasha, Basil, and we're seniors at Clarell McKenna College in sunny Southern California, and we just submitted our senior theses. This podcast was recorded at 1.46 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesday, April 23rd. Things may have changed by the time you hear this, but we'll probably still be celebrating! Woo-hoo! still be celebrating. Congratulations. You are D-O-N-E. That's right. That's how we sound when we finish our story. Yeah, right. I wish. Hey, there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Claudia Grisales. I cover Congress. And I'm Mara Eliason, national political correspondent.

Democrats have long dreamed of turning Texas blue, but in some traditionally Democratic districts near the U.S.-Mexico border, it could actually be getting more red. Claudia, you did a big reporting trip to the state, and we're hoping you can tell us what you saw. Yes, yes. I was there for nearly two weeks. I drove about 300 miles along the border communities from Eagle Pass. And this is where we've seen Republicans use this community as a staging area in their war against President Biden's border policies. And also drove down to communities closer to Brownsville. This is where President Biden recently visited. And it's truly a diverse region. And as you mentioned, it used to be this blue pocket, but we're seeing it turn red. There are four congressional districts along this stretch. Democrat thinks she has a chance to head to Congress. And the Democrat is Michelle Vallejo. This is a small business owner. She's in a rematch with the Republican incumbent in that seat, Monica de la Cruz.

She's a former insurance agent. Both were political newcomers in the last election cycle, where we saw Republicans flip this district from blue to red in 2022. But Vallejo and Dem say they can reverse the trends here this year. We are the only swing seat that we could flip from red to blue in Texas. We have a lot of work to do here, but I know that with all of the support of our community and supporters outside of our region, we could get this done. And we should note the lines were redrawn in Texas a year earlier. Redistricting gave Republicans this massive structural advantage. And De La Cruz had more significant support from national Republicans. But national Democrats are stepping in this year. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee named it one of its first offensive targets to flip this district. But, you know, it's going to be a challenge here overall for Democrats.

It's going to be an uphill fight. What's so interesting to me is we are now way beyond the demography is destiny theory for Democrats, who, of course, thought that as the electorate got browner, they would be benefited by that. And that just isn't what's happening. Claudia, what kind of messaging are Democrats using in this 15th congressional district to try to win over swing voters or, you know, try to actually get this district back? What we're seeing, Vallejo, in Democrats' push is the connection between Monica de la Cruz and former President Trump. Some of these extremist positions, for example, limiting access to reproductive choice or limiting access to abortion, as well as the launch of a

series of partisan investigations, the impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, and also the potential impeachment of President Biden, although that appears to have stalled in the House. And so these are the kind of issues that don't play as well in these very moderate districts along the border. Claudia, talk to us about the demographics of this district that you're looking at. Yeah, so what we're seeing along the border districts is these probably more closely mirror rural districts. And Democrats, what I was told by one professor, Alvaro Corral, at the University of Texas, the Rio Grande Valley, is that Democrats look at Texas and they look at it in terms of opportunity. They're going to bank on urban areas. And those

border districts are not going to have similar urban regions like, say, Austin, Houston, Dallas, where Democrats really see gains. And I did meet with some voters who were voting for Vallejo and other Democrats in McAllen. So you will find a lot of her support there. But it really stretches into these rural regions. And this is where Democrats have been faltering. The same professor mentioned to me that he looked at a county, for example, in that district, Cameron County, and you can see the share of Republican ballots growing and the share of Democratic ballots shrinking. And so even when you isolate the concerns of redistricting and gerrymandering, you can see Republicans have made significant gains here. And when we're talking about the demographics, Latinos, the Tejano voter, they're a very unique subset, and Republicans have done a very good job speaking to them.

So border district Tejanos or Hispanics in Texas do not put immigration as their top issue. Is that what you're saying? When I'm talking to Latino voters, the way they look at it, many of them, is that they are frustrated with Democratic policies along the border. They're hearing Republicans when they attack President Biden and other Democrats in terms of how they've handled the border. They feel they have faltered. And so it still remains a top issue. But there's other issues as well that they do prioritize. Yes. And of course, Mara, talk to us about how Biden's messaging on immigration has sort of shifted. He has been leaning in on a tough on the border

sort of message, though it was rejected by House Republicans. What's so interesting, it's just the timing of this. I mean, what Democrats want is to have a message that says we don't want any illegal immigration, but we want a lot of legal immigration and we want to treat legal immigrants humanely because we have a severe labor shortage in this country. But what happened with Biden, there was the reaction to Trump's, what Democrats considered to be cruel, immigration policy. So he came in sending a message that he was going to be more welcoming. He wasn't going to separate children from their parents at the border, etc. But then, for a variety of reasons, climate change, economics, etc., the border got to be out of control. And Republicans were not going to give him the extra border agents and money that he needed or wanted to control the

borders. So when this issue became huge, and by the way, I think the trigger point was when border state Republican governors started busing asylum seekers to blue state cities and states, and it became an issue not just in Martha's Vineyard, but in Chicago and New York, Biden started to have a tougher line on immigration. He tried to make a deal, a deal that was the most conservative immigration bill in a generation. Democrats made all sorts of concessions. But Donald Trump at the end said, nope, we're not going to pass this because that might actually help control the border and help Biden politically. So we'd rather have the issue. All right, we're going to take a quick break and we will have more in a moment. And we're back. And we've been talking about Texas, but we've

also seen Republicans make inroads with Democratic voters in Florida. Claudia, are they using the same strategy in that state, the same messaging to Latino voters? Well, they are having the same success. That messaging is being tweaked a little bit to match that demographic. When we look at Texas, for example, we're hearing Republicans nail down on the issues between the U.S.-Mexico border and the crisis there. When we look at Florida, however, we're going to see Republicans messaging with issues such as seeing the issues in Cuba, for example, the Cuban regime and the concerns of socialism and very closely equating socialism with Democrats. And Republicans have had incredible

success making gains with Latino voters in the Miami area, for example, with Cuban immigrants and generations of families who have lived there because they remember this Cuban regime. They don't want it to come to the U.S. This is what they escaped. And so they are clearly connecting with this kind of Republican messaging. So it's a pretty smart strategy, if you will, in terms of how they've tweaked it and been able to make gains on Latino voters there, but with even more success. Don't forget about Venezuelans. Yeah. Basically, when we see the different groups, Venezolanos, for example, are struggling with the same issue. So they don't want to run into the same problems in the United States that they had

in their countries of origin. And so Democrats have kind of missed the boat on that issue, and they're trying to gain this year, but they have a long ways to go. Yeah, Mara, I have to imagine that National Democrats are looking at these shifts in these heavily Latino areas of the country and, you know, like raising the alarm bell. Oh, there's no doubt about that. Now, of course, Texas and Florida are pretty solid red states. They're not battleground states. But Democrats do have to be worried about a drop off in support among Latino voters, also young people. But there was a time when Barack Obama won the young Cuban-American vote in Florida. Yeah, one common theme I also saw when I was in

Florida last year is the way that some Latinos identify in the Miami area, talking to professors in the region, they more quickly identify as white in surveys. And so they're going to take a similar stance to white voters in many cases. So that's another area where Republicans have had an advantage. All right, well, we're going to leave it there for now. A huge thank you to everyone who supports the show by donating to your local NPR station or by signing up for NPR Politics Plus. That helps us make reporting like Claudia's possible. If you haven't signed up for NPR Politics Plus, now's your chance. You get things like sponsor free listening and bonus episodes. Our latest bonus episode features a recent story I did about the disbelief I kept hearing from voters

that President Biden really will be on the ballot this November. To sign up for PLUS, just go to plus.npr.org slash politics. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Claudia Grisales. I cover Congress. And I'm Mara Liason, national political correspondent. And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.