Special Investigations

Press Freedom Defense Fund

Texas Progressives Say Democratic Establishment Is Blowing It In the Rio Grande Valley

Locals think the party overlearned the lessons of Trump’s surprising gains — and should stay out of the way.

Just four years ago, a progressive primary challenger with endorsements from Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., fell 281 votes short of toppling scandal-stained incumbent Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Texas.

Cuellar went on to win the general election in the 28th Congressional District. Then he won again in 2024, despite a federal bribery indictment. In December, President Donald Trump granted Cuellar a pardon from federal charges.

Trump’s assist might have generated a serious primary challenge for a Democrat elsewhere, but Cuellar does not have any well-funded opponents this time around in Texas’s primary elections on Tuesday.

That trend has repeated itself along the Texas border. In districts where progressives once drew national attention and fundraising dollars, a handful of candidates in the left lane are mounting shoestring campaigns.

Texas politicos chalked that phenomenon up to the disappointment from the defeat of progressive candidates in 2022 and 2024, mid-decade redistricting that made several seats in Texas more conservative, and concerns from national groups that some Latinos have permanently swung to the right after voting for Trump in 2024.

“There’s a decided progressive shift, especially among Democratic voters who are desperate for real change.”

“There’s a decided progressive shift, especially among Democratic voters who are desperate for real change.”

Some observers, however, believe that there’s a chance that Democrats may overlearned the lessons of 2024, when Trump made historic inroads among Latino voters along the border.

“I think there’s a decided progressive shift, especially among Democratic voters who are desperate for real change,” said Jon Taylor, a political science professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio. “But I think they’re desperate to find candidates who can articulate that.”

One of the candidates who is vying for progressive votes Ada Cuellar, an emergency room doctor who has tapped her retirement fund as national donors line up behind a centrist competitor.

Ada Cuellar, no relation to Henry, is running in the Democratic primary against Tejano music scion Bobby Pulido in the 15th Congressional District, which stretches from McAllen on the border to the suburbs of San Antonio. Pulido has cast himself as the candidate most attuned to the district’s attitudes on social issues such as guns and abortion rights.

Washington Democrats are gushing over Pulido’s prospects to win over Republicans in a district that went 58 percent to 40 percent for Trump over Kamala Harris in 2024. Only a shotgun-wielding centrist like Pulido has a chance, the theory goes.

Cuellar disagrees. While she eschews the “progressive” label — she considers herself an “independent Democrat” — she is running on a platform that includes support for Medicare for All and abortion rights.

“The establishment has misread the moment, and they really shouldn’t have made a pick here,” said Cuellar. “I really think they shouldn’t make picks in general.”

Early polls, including one conducted by Cuellar’s campaign, showed her far behind the singer. The $824,000 that Ada Cuellar has loaned her own campaign, though, appears to be evening the score.

“They........

© The Intercept