CHICAGO — U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar was shocked when she was tapped last year to serve on President Joe Biden’s campaign. Then the surprises kept coming.
As a national co-chair of the Biden-turned-Kamala Harris presidential campaign, she defended the president and vice president through border security and Israel-Hamas war policy she disagreed with, a disastrous debate performance that put Biden’s electability into question and calls from her own party for Biden to step down. The El Paso Democrat has crisscrossed the country to represent the campaign, including dropping into the Republican National Convention to lead counter programming. Then on Thursday, she chaired the last night of the Democratic National Convention, introducing Harris as she formally accepted the party’s nomination.
“The last four weeks have felt like a decade in terms of news and transitions and surprises and challenges and opportunities,” Escobar, who is in her third term in Congress, said. “Every day is a new day, and it’s been exciting to say the least.”
It’s a perch that has allowed a Texan to have a seat at the table in a presidential campaign that has largely written off the state as an unrealistic target this cycle. She and the other co-chairs work on messaging and strategy with the campaign, and travel the country speaking to voters and media on behalf of the ticket, including during some of its most fraught moments.
She is the only Texan to hold her position, sharing the title with long-time Biden allies like his fellow Delawareans Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester and Sen. Chris Coons and former White House infrastructure lead Mitch Landrieu of Louisiana. It’s also given her a national platform, speaking from the DNC main stage and emceeing the convention on its final night — a platform that has traditionally catapulted rising stars in the party to higher office.
Escobar won her seat replacing U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke in 2018. She and O’Rourke brought national attention to their district that year leading a protest highlighting child migrant detention by the then-Trump administration in El Paso.
The position comes from her relationship with the Biden White House, with whom she has collaborated frequently on issues related to the border and poverty. She also serves as a messenger to two of the party’s most important demographics: women and Latino voters.
“Her profile as a Latina is so important for the campaign and who we’re trying to reach,” state Sen. Cesar Blanco, D-El Paso, said. “When you look at who has so much to lose this election cycle, we've seen it with the issue of abortion, you have to put people in these roles that are strong that are leaders that have a sense of understanding of what women go through.”
But the job has also come with political pitfalls, including defending Biden at the lowest point of his presidency.
Her support for the president was put under the microscope after Biden’s botched debate against Trump last month. Biden’s verbal fumbles amplified concerns about his advanced age and shook Democrats’ confidence in the race.
The day after the debate, reporters swarmed Democrats in Congress to get their takes. Speaking to a throng of reporters eager for her opinion as a campaign co-chair, Escobar acknowledged “it was not the night any of us wanted.” But less than three weeks later, she was on her way to Milwaukee to help lead counter programming to the Republican National Convention, assuring her fellow Democrats that the Biden-Harris ticket was still the party’s best bet.
“He's our nominee,” Escobar said in Milwaukee on the sidelines of the RNC. “We've got 100 days until the election. We have the infrastructure across the country. The Biden Harris team has had phenomenal fundraising. Surrogates have been doing their job.”
Two Texas Democrats — U.S. Reps. Lloyd Doggett of Austin and Marc Veasey of Fort Worth — both publicly called on Biden to step down.
Escobar said at the time that “I don't find the public statements to be helpful either to the party or to our nominee,” though she said her colleagues had “every right to speak on any issue just as I do.”
Looking back at Biden’s decision to step down, Escobar said while it was shocking, it also wasn’t totally surprising “because he's such a patriot and he cares so deeply about ensuring that we win this election.”
With Democratic enthusiasm on the rise, the age-old question of whether Texas can turn blue has been revived — a debate that played out across the DNC. The Harris campaign, which cobbled together in the hours after Biden dropped out of the race, has been keeping a narrow focus on the most easily attainable states to secure a victory, opting not to invest in Texas. Escobar defended the decision.
“I do consider us a battleground state, but for the purposes of getting to 270, there are states that are obviously far more critical in terms of achieving that goal,” Escobar said.
She’s not alone in the sentiment. Texas Democratic Party Chair Gilberto Hinojosa said the runway is too short for the presidential campaign to invest seriously in Texas. Candidates from Senate candidate Colin Allred down are bundling resources in a coordinated campaign. But they shouldn’t expect help from the very top of the ticket.
“There's just not enough time to get to a safe zone right where they would have the extra resources to invest in more difficult states like Texas,” Hinojosa said.
That’s not to say that Escobar has stood by the White House in everything. Escobar broke from the Biden camp on its border policy, particularly a bipartisan Senate border deal that would have limited asylum.
Harris vowed to sign the bipartisan border bill into law Thursday night during her main stage speech after accepting the party’s nomination.
The proposal, negotiated by independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy, Republican Sen. James Lankford and the White House, did not make it out of the Senate after Republicans turned on it at the last minute.
Escobar said it was “not an immigration bill. The Senate bill was an enforcement only bill.”
She was in the minority among her peers. When Biden urged the bill’s passage during the State of the Union address this year, most Democrats gave a standing ovation. Escobar remained seated with her hands together.
The Biden campaign has continued to push the bill as the answer to concerns over border security, with the buy-in from the deeply conservative Lankford helping the campaign stave accusations from Republicans that it is too soft on the issue.
She was also an early backer of a ceasefire in Gaza — long before Biden eased on his hawkish support of Israel’s strategy in the region.
When asked if that has caused conflicts with the Biden campaign, Escobar said, “Not at all.”
“The President and the team chose me to be a national co-chair knowing full well what my views and opinions were,” Escobar said last June.
Having skipped a formal primary process, Harris hasn’t had to enumerate her policy platform. Escobar sees a potential in that gap in crafting more immigrant-centered border policy and said she was “definitely going to leverage my role as a co-chair into getting some facetime around the policy positions for the White House.”
Harris clarified some of her policy platform on the convention stage Thursday. She went further than she had in the past on Gaza, calling for a cease-fire deal that would ensure “Israel is secure, the hostages are released, the suffering in Gaza ends and the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity, security, freedom and self-determination.”
Escobar has already reaped some of the rewards of her loyal service to the campaign. She had the most stage time at the national convention of any Texan in a year when Texas was heavily represented on stage.
“Congresswoman Escobar has never backed away from the fight for the communities she represents, and together we will work to create more opportunities for hardworking families: from lowering health care costs, to protecting Dreamers and increasing funding for small business owners, to continuing to address the plague of gun violence,” Harris campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez said in a statement.
The convention stage has created national names for several Democratic stars in the past. Former President Barack Obama drew national prominence at the 2004 convention.
“I wouldn't be surprised if she was someone who flipped a statewide seat,” U.S. Rep. Greg Casar, D-Austin, said. Casar has known Escobar since his time on the Austin City Council when Escobar was El Paso County Judge. “That's entirely within her potential.”
When asked if she would ever take a position in a Harris White House, Escobar laughed.
“We’ve got to win in November,” she said.
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