Cuellar is not just running in place
WASHINGTON — Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, is accustomed to winning big, averaging more than 70 percent of the vote in his last half-dozen general elections.
In eight terms, he has established himself as a distinctly moderate Democrat despite representing a district so blue that Hillary Clinton won in Webb County, his home, with 74 percent of the vote.
Now, responding to a primary challenge from the left, Cuellar has moved into full-hustle mode to protect his seat, gathering endorsements, dispatching paid canvassers and trumpeting his work in Congress.
His opponent: Jessica Cisneros, 26, the daughter of Mexican immigrants and an immigration lawyer who has drawn national backing — including an endorsement from presidential contender Elizabeth Warren.
In normal times, Cuellar’s flush campaign fund of $3.24 million and fullthroated backing from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and congressional Democrats’ political arm would seem sufficient for his re-election.
But that’s less certain now with progressive Democrats on the ascent in Washington and beyond. So Cuellar last week pushed out a lengthy list of local Democratic officeholders backing his re-election — 114 of them — and promises another such list in coming days.
Cuellar, 64, a senior appropriator on Capitol Hill, is touting his work on
A well-bundled and shivering Sandra Hernandez stepped into the warmth of Caballero Bakery and out of the frosty, 38-degree morning held at bay by the tiny West Side panadería’s front door.
A couple of dozen conchas, cuernos, empanadas and campechanas later, she was ready to once again face the chill, warmed by her role of pastry fairy with boxes of sweet treats for her office and a neighboring business.
“Everybody is cold,” Hernandez declared. “We want something sweet.”
South Texas has a serious sweet tooth, and in San Antonio, that goes into hyperdrive every time the temperature dips. When head baker Wilmer Caballero saw Tuesday’s weather prediction, his inner meteorologist, finely tuned after more than 20 years in bakeries in San Antonio and his native Honduras, knew exactly what to do.
Bump up the concha count from the usual 200 to 450. Throw in a few hundred extra empanadas.
He single-handedly kneaded and rolled 50 pounds of flour more than a normal day’s 100 pounds into about three-dozen different traditional pan dulce shapes by 9 a.m.
Nobody in the shop expected anything but a slice of cake or two to be left by closing time.
Lydia Leos, who runs the year-old Caballero Bakery with her husband, Elmer Caballero, and brother-in-law, Wilmer Caballero, said it’s like clockwork. “Any change in weather, if it’s cold, rainy, slippery, people flock in like crazy,” Leos said. “Let me tell you honestly, our sales have more than doubled over the past few weeks just because of the weather.
Janie Villarreal McClinchie, a Laredo-born San Antonio artist, isn’t
the newly negotiated U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade deal and trumpeting benefits of Democratic-engineered legislation to reduce prescription drug costs and give federal workers paid parental leave.
Last week, nearly three months before the primary, the Cuellar campaign dispatched 20 paid canvassers into the district, which stretches from San Antonio's East Side to his home base of Laredo and as far south as McAllen.
“We're trying to be aggressive and get the word out that we're running a very serious campaign and we're going to have the foot soldiers in the form of local elected officials getting out our message and getting out the vote,” said Colin Strother, the lead consultant for Cuellar's re-election drive.
“What we want to do is help people understand that Twitter is not the real world,” Strother said. “Just because they have a really strong Twitter presence, that doesn't change the reality on the ground.”
Social media is an active part of the Cisneros fundraising and messaging, which began early this year with the backing of Justice Democrats, a Tennesseebased organization pressing for the election of left-of-center party members.
Cisneros has drawn financial backing from an array of national organizations, aided by her endorsement from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the first-term congresswoman from New York who has arrived in the political world with considerable buzz, and a well-known acronym, AOC.
Cisneros has been quoted as saying: “I'm not trying to be the next AOC. I'm focused on being the next Jessica Cisneros, a fearless Tejana who speaks truth to power, because that is who my home district needs me to be.”
In an interview, Cisneros contended the flurry of activity by Cuellar is a good sign for her campaign.
“The fact that he's releasing this endorsement list, the fact that he's all of a sudden feeling it necessary to send out canvassers, these are all things he hasn't done in previous cycles. And for us that's great, because it means that he's finally taking us seriously,” she said.
Cisneros contends that Democrats have reason to reject an incumbent for being out of step with the district, even an incumbent with clout on the Appropriations Committee.
“We feel that we have had absentee leadership,” Cisneros said. “When he shows up to places with a giant check, it doesn't necessarily mean it's stuff his office is putting forth. In reality, it's been a lot of work for community organizations applying for grants. People get upset sometimes when he comes along with a check trying to take credit when actually it's the work of people in our community,”
She pointed to Cuellar's record of often voting in accord with President Donald Trump.
“This is a district that rejected Trump,” she said.
Cisneros last week proposed four town hall-style debates. It's unlikely she'll get her wish.
Strother said in an email that Cuellar would have to cancel long-standing meetings for a debate that “would help her build her campaign and get attention that she's not earning on her own merits.”
Asked if that's a no, Strother replied: “It's not a no so much as it's not even a consideration. She is not a serious candidate.”