Austin’s New True Congressman

Redistricting in 2021 had as its most important objective locking into place the partisan establishment in new Texas suburban battlefields like Hays County, however Texas’ continued progress gave the state two new congressional seats that needed to go someplace, and one among them got here to Austin to be a vote sink for all of the Democrats who had tried to unseat their GOP congressmen within the 5 years prior. That new TX-37 was claimed by veteran Rep. Lloyd Doggett, leaving his previous TX-35 open as one other solidly blue (Biden +46!) pickup alternative, and after seven years on Council, Casar determined to leap. So did state Rep. Eddie Rodriguez, D-Austin, who gave up a 20-year profession within the Texas Home to finish up ending a distant second, 36 factors behind Casar. Former San Antonio Council Member Rebecca Viagran took third place (the district stretches to the Alamo, though most of its voters are in Travis and Hays counties).

Casar’s controversial profession as Council’s main progressive activist included persuading his colleagues to reject the proposed police contract in 2017, decriminalize homelessness in 2019, and really defund the Austin Police Division in 2020 after its violent response to peaceable protest. All of those measures had been overturned by highly effective Republicans, and Rodriguez went adverse towards Casar utilizing related language and pictures as Save Austin Now, which proved a disastrous technique for the Capitol veteran. In the meantime, Casar used his race to carry consideration to native unionization efforts (see p.20) and obtained the rock stars of the Democratic left – AOC, Bernie, Warren – to carry consideration to him, a sample we anticipate to proceed in Congress.