Join The Temporary, our every day e-newsletter that retains readers on top of things on essentially the most important Texas information.
WASHINGTON — A political knife struggle within the streets of Laredo. An bold challenger with highly effective allies and formidable fundraising. A longtime congressman who as soon as coasted to reelection dealing with an existential check amid redistricting in a Democratic main.
The yr was 2004, and it was the final yr any Texas Democratic congressmen would lose reelection in a main.
And in that Laredo race, the challenger was Henry Cuellar.
Advertisement
Eighteen years later, the tables have turned on the now-senior Democrat. He faces a bonafide menace to his political livelihood within the type of legal professional Jessica Cisneros, a progressive darling, fellow Laredo native and former intern in Cuellar’s congressional workplace.
The Could 24 main runoff election is a rematch from two years in the past, when Cisneros fell simply in need of pushing Cuellar to a runoff in 2020. She is difficult him once more, and as soon as extra, liberal teams are solidly consolidated behind her. Cuellar is undoubtedly formidable, with the backing of a number of the get together’s high nationwide leaders.
However after an unrelenting slew of unhealthy political information for Cuellar this yr, he’s by no means been extra weak.
Previous to the Could 3 leak of a U.S. Supreme Court docket draft ruling that seems able to overturn Roe v. Wade, the matchup was already attracting the eye of Democratic leaders in a race that embodied the yearslong struggle between progressives and pragmatists for management of the get together.
However now, Cuellar’s file because the final anti-abortion Democrat within the Home has reignited ire from members of the get together from throughout the nation, who’re nonetheless reeling from the studies that abortion may quickly be outlawed in half of the nation. On that situation and different insurance policies — unions, border safety, and oil and gasoline — he and Cisneros are at odds.
Advertisement
U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, at a Get Out the Vote rally in San Antonio on Could 4, 2022.
Credit score:
Chris Stokes for The Texas Tribune
Advertisement
“The stakes are very excessive,” stated Jose Borjon, a Washington-based lobbyist initially from South Texas who as soon as labored for Cuellar and continues to help him.
“This can be a large deal for Democrats,” he added, suggesting that this race serves as a proxy struggle amid a bigger divide throughout the get together nationally. “It’s an enormous deal for the temper of our nation. It’s an enormous deal in politics … as a result of it pits progressive insurance policies espoused by Cisneros over extra centrist insurance policies espoused by Cuellar.”
The Supreme Court docket leak roiled the race, however Cuellar’s marketing campaign was already injured from when the FBI performed a mysterious and nonetheless unexplained raid on his Laredo house and marketing campaign workplace weeks earlier than the March main. Cuellar’s legal professional has stated the FBI knowledgeable him that Cuellar isn’t a goal of an investigation, and Cuellar has denied wrongdoing.
Cisneros capitalized on the information, elevating a shocking amount of cash for the race.
Six weeks later, Cuellar was unable in March to win the first outright, falling in need of the bulk wanted to keep away from a runoff.
Advertisement
Earlier than the raid, he started the marketing campaign season from a stronger place than two years in the past: He raised thousands and thousands of {dollars} over the past two years for this race, and he modernized his political operation. Cisneros, too, is an improved candidate this yr. She first ran as a 26-year-old contemporary out of regulation faculty. This time round, she has a extra polished presentation and her nationwide progressive supporters are much more decided to take out Cuellar.
“I satisfaction myself on having an ear to the bottom and I say that as a result of if the problems we’re working on aren’t essential to folks within the district, there was no manner {that a} first-time, 26-year-old challenger final time round would have come so near defeating an incumbent that is been in workplace longer than I’ve been alive, proper?” Cisneros stated in an interview earlier this month.
Recently, Cisneros has leaned into her stance for abortion rights as a distinction to Cuellar’s file. However in different instances, she softened her rhetoric on a number of the positions she took in 2018 that gave her blowback.
As an example, within the final marketing campaign cycle, Cisneros advocated to “cut up [U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement] in half and reassign enforcement features … to different businesses, together with the Division of Justice,” in a candidate survey with 350 Motion, a bunch fashioned to struggle local weather change.
This February, Cuellar’s camp seized on that time, saying in a broadly seen tv commercial that her place could be “… leaving us with open borders that will make us much less protected and value us 1000’s of jobs, placing our safety and economic system in jeopardy.”
Advertisement
When requested if she nonetheless backed that ICE coverage from November 2019, Cisneros targeted on influence to jobs.
“I’d by no means help any type of coverage or laws that will take anybody’s jobs away as a result of I, myself, know the way troublesome it’s making ends meet,” she stated.
“I understand how scary it’s for folks to suppose that their livelihood goes to be messed with,” she added.
However Cisneros nonetheless embraces her progressivism with abandon.
She describes abortion “as well being care.” She helps a Inexperienced New Deal in oil and gasoline nation. And her marketing campaign has hosted a succession of progressive celebrities — together with U.S. Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, plus U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York — who’ve come to the district to marketing campaign for her.
Advertisement
Cuellar in bother
It’s noteworthy each time a U.S. Home incumbent loses reelection in a main as a result of such losses are so uncommon. Sometimes, solely a small handful of members lose this fashion every cycle. The final U.S. Home member to lose reelection from Texas was in 2014, when U.S. Rep. Ralph Corridor misplaced the Republican nomination to John Ratcliffe, who went on to serve in Congress and because the director of nationwide intelligence underneath President Donald Trump.
The 2 strongest indicators of political hazard for a Texas U.S. Home incumbent are dealing with a runoff problem and being outraised by a challenger.
Cuellar at the moment faces each circumstances.
In an interview within the days after the Supreme Court docket abortion information, Cisneros stated her fundraising employees was inundated by donors motivated to oust an anti-abortion Democrat.
And that’s contemporary cash that got here into the Cisneros group after marketing campaign finance studies displaying that by Could 4, she had raised $4.5 million over the course of the cycle, in comparison with Cuellar’s $3.1 million.
Advertisement
Compared, there’s a a lot quieter Democratic main in a much more costly tv promoting market in Dallas. The 2 candidates there, state Rep. Jasmine Crockett and former Congressional staffer Jane Hamilton, have raised $567,000 and $654,000, respectively.
Cuellar allies argue that abortion is a sophisticated situation within the closely Catholic area, and that different points matter extra to voters, together with border safety, which is a matter they anticipate will profit Cuellar. Cuellar has sided with Republicans in calling for President Joe Biden to maintain in place Title 42, a pandemic-era coverage that permits immigration officers to expel migrants on the southern border with out giving them an opportunity to hunt asylum.
And regardless of the renewed scrutiny of this race, they argue Cuellar’s work ethic and ties to the group will earn him a tenth time period. Borjon, the previous Cuellar staffer, instructed The Texas Tribune that whereas making an attempt to achieve out to Cuellar final week, the congressman briefly stepped apart to take the decision whereas attending a neighborhood commencement ceremony in his district — certainly one of at the least 5 Cuellar was scheduled to attend over the weekend.
“Henry Cuellar will present as much as something for anybody, anyplace within the twenty eighth District of Texas,” Borjon stated. “He is without doubt one of the hardest-working members of Congress that I do know.”
Cuellar declined a request for an interview.
Advertisement
A fractured get together
Regardless of the tumult, Cuellar’s highly effective allies have doubled down on their help of him.
U.S. Home Speaker Nancy Pelosi reiterated her help for Cuellar final week, an announcement that enraged and astonished the left within the wake of the Supreme Court docket developments.
“I am supporting Henry Cuellar,” she stated at a information convention. “He’s a valued member of our caucus.”
On the similar time, EMILY’s Checklist, an influential group that works to elect Democratic girls who help abortion rights and with whom Pelosi has been carefully aligned for many years, is certainly one of Cisneros’ strongest backers. Final week the group booked a few half-million-dollar tv promoting purchase to assist Cisneros.
Pelosi final week repeated studies that his legal professional stated Cuellar was not a goal of the FBI investigation. She added that anti-abortion Democrats have served within the Home earlier than, and his vote was not wanted to cross a invoice within the Home to codify Roe v. Wade into federal regulation final fall.
Advertisement
“He’s not pro-choice, however we didn’t want him,” she stated. “We handed the invoice with what we had.”
And she or he’s not alone: U.S. Rep. James Clyburn, the third-ranking Home Democrat, campaigned for Cuellar earlier this month in San Antonio, and the fourth-ranking Home Democrat, U.S. Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York donated to Cuellar’s marketing campaign in a latest marketing campaign finance report.
Now not a Democratic bulwark
When Cuellar first gained in 2004, an Austin Chronicle recap of that yr’s elections across the state described South Texas as a area that “stays the state’s Democratic bulwark.”
The 2020 election shattered that long-held consensus, as Democrats throughout the area noticed their margins shrink to underfunded Republican candidates.
So now for the primary time in trendy historical past, South Texas Democrats need to issue the overall election into their concerns in selecting their nominees as a result of coming Republican onslaught which will likely be led by both Cassy Garcia or Sandra Whitten, who’re competing for the Republican nomination in their very own runoff.
Advertisement
In April, political analyst David Wasserman stated out loud to the Tribune what many Republican and Democratic operatives have been saying privately: South Texas is way extra socially conservative than many Democratic-leaning hubs, and lots of of Cisneros’ largest supporters don’t dwell in her district. As such, Cuellar is the extra electable contender within the fall, Wasserman and others have argued.
When requested about this notion, Cisneros stated her ascent signifies she is extra in contact with the district.
“Individuals typically say that about incumbents, proper?” Cisneros instructed the Tribune. “I believe the enhance that Henry claims to get is one which stems from him being an incumbent, not a lot somebody that’s really representing the values of the district.”
Tickets are on sale now for the 2022 Texas Tribune Competition, occurring in downtown Austin on Sept. 22-24. Get your TribFest tickets by Could 31 and save large!
Texas Rangers rookie outfielder Wyatt Langford appeared on the GBag Nation show on 105.3 The Fan (KRLD-FM) to discuss his recent offensive surge, how he’s adjusting to the big leagues, and what kind of weight he can throw around in the weight room.
Here are some of the highlights, edited lightly for clarity.
What has been the biggest difference since you came off the IL? How eye-opening is it to get accustomed to major league pitching?
Wyatt Langford: I think a lot of it was just comfort, getting comfortable playing up here and getting accustomed to the pitching. Everyone throws hard nowadays, and they all know where to put it too.
Advertisement
Rangers
Be the smartest Rangers fan. Get the latest news.
You’ve been very unlucky dealing with bad calls in the strike zone, how do you deal with that frustration?
Langford: It has been a little frustrating because of how frequently it has happened, but I mean it’s part of the game. I feel like I’ve handled it pretty well.
Advertisement
What are the biggest differences between playing college baseball and playing in the major leagues?
Langford: I’d say the biggest difference is just playing every single day. College, you’re playing three to five days a week at the most. You’re just going about it every single day and getting your body ready to play every day.
Watch: Texas Rangers rookie Wyatt Langford blasts off with first career grand slam
How nice is it having veterans like Marcus Semien and Corey Seager and being able to see their example of dedication?
Langford: It’s been great. There’s so many guys on this team that have a lot of experience, a lot of success playing this game. Being able to talk to them and be around them helps a lot.
What’s the best advice you’ve gotten since getting to the big leagues?
Advertisement
Langford: I wouldn’t say there’s really any best advice I’ve gotten. I’d say just in general, just make sure you be yourself and do what you need to do to get ready. You don’t don’t need to copy what other guys do to get ready. [Corey Seager] does his thing, [Marcus Semien] does his thing. You just got to figure out what works for you.
You’re very impressive physically, what’s the most impressive thing you could do in a weight room? Back squat?
Langford: I haven’t back squatted since my freshman year of college, so probably deadlift. The most I’ve ever done is 715 pounds over winter break at Florida. I was back home during my sophomore year.
Texas Rangers’ late-inning offensive woes persist, bats go quietly again vs. Brewers
Dane Dunning shifting to Texas Rangers bullpen with Max Scherzer back in rotation
Find more Rangers coverage from The Dallas Morning News here.
Click or tap here to sign up for our Rangers newsletter.
Bridget Townsend was just getting her start in life as a young woman in the small Texas town of Bandera when Ramiro Gonzales raped and killed her. Her mom says she was ‘a beautiful person.’
Bridget Townsend was planning for the future. The Texas 18-year-old was working full-time at a resort and eagerly waiting to hear back about an application to get into nursing school.
But on Jan. 14, 2001, a man named Ramiro Gonzales stole all that away and all the other moments and milestones that make up a life when he kidnapped, raped and murdered Bridget.
“She was a beautiful person who loved life and loved people,” her mother, Patricia Townsend, told USA TODAY on Saturday. “Every time she was with somebody she hadn’t seen in a while, she had to hug ’em … She didn’t deserve what she got.”
Advertisement
Now more than 23 years later, Gonzales is set to be executed for the crime in Texas on Wednesday, which would have been Bridget’s 41st birthday. Patricia Townsend said the execution will be a “joyful occasion” for her and her family, who have been waiting so long for justice.
As Gonzales’ execution approaches, USA TODAY is looking back at the tragic crime, who Bridget was what her family lost.
A terrible night
Bridget was at her boyfriend Joe Leal’s house that terrible night.
Leal dealt drugs and Gonzales went to his house to steal cocaine, finding Bridget there alone.
After Gonzales came in and stole some cash, Bridget started to call Leal. That’s when Gonzales overpowered her, tied her up and drove her to his grandfather’s ranch, where he raped and shot her before dumping her body in a field, according to court records.
Advertisement
When Leal arrived home later that night, Bridget’s truck, purse and keys were their usual spots but he couldn’t find her anywhere and called police.
For nearly two years, no one but Gonzales knew what happened to Bridget. One day while he was serving a life sentence for the rape and kidnapping of another woman, Gonzales decided to confess to killing Bridget, leading authorities to her remains in a field in Bandera, a small town 40 miles northwest of San Antonio.
Gonzales was convicted of Bridget’s murder in September 2006.
Advertisement
‘Thank God I got to see her’
Patricia Townsend last saw her daughter the same day she was killed. Townsend was working at a video store and had asked Bridget to drop by and return a video.
“Thank God I got to see her. And I told her I loved her. And I hugged her,” Townsend said.
Bridget left soon after, saying she was going to bed because she had to drive to work in the morning. Townsend told her daughter goodbye, reminding her that she loved her.
After Townsend closed the video store and went home for the night, she said she couldn’t shake the feeling that she heard Bridget call out to her: “Mom.” She tried to call Bridget but there was no answer.
“And I said, ‘Well don’t fret, Pat.’ She said she had to get up early and go to work so she’s probably sleeping,” Townsend said. “But I should have known better because always slept with her phone right next to her in case somebody called her.”
Advertisement
She thought about going to check on Bridget but talked herself out of it.
“And to this day I regret not going out there,” she said. “Maybe I would have been there in time to stop him.”
Patricia Townsend gets worst news of her life
For nearly two years, Townsend spent most of her time putting up flyers about her daughter and chasing leads.
Until one night a Bandera County sheriff asked her to come to the station. Although she had been holding out hope that her daughter was alive despite the odds, she instead got the worst news of her life.
Advertisement
The sheriff told Townsend that Gonzales had confessed to Bridget’s murder, had led police to her body and that he had some things he was hoping she might be able to identify.
“And I walked on down the street. I couldn’t hear it anymore,” she said.
Towsend says she didn’t even have a body to bury on Oct. 16, 2002 because Gonzales “wanted to see her body decay.”
Townsend rejected arguments from Gonzales that a childhood filled with trauma and neglect helped lead him down a path that ended in her daughter’s murder.
Advertisement
“He doesn’t deserve mercy,” she said. “And his childhood should not have anything to do with it. I know a lot of people that had a hard childhood … He made his choice.”
It’s Gonzales’ own fault that he no longer has a life.
“He could be going to school or have a wife and kids,” she said. “I don’t feel sorry for him at all and I don’t want other people to feel sorry for him. Some people I feel sorry for are his grandma and grandpa that raised him.”
What has also brought comfort to Townsend amid the grief is that Gonzales is set to leave the world the same day Bridget came into it.
“When they told me June 26, I started crying, crying and crying,” she said. “That’s her birthday.”
Advertisement
Instead of celebrating her daughter’s 41st birthday, she’ll drive four hours from her home in San Antonio to the Texas State Penitentiary in Huntsville and watch Gonzales die.
Silvia Hernandez, with her hair pulled back into a long ponytail, is visible from the kitchen only when she comes to the metal-framed pass, where the server grabs plated dishes to run to customers. Her glasses are precariously balanced on the lower bridge of her nose, but she snaps them back into place as she turns to attend to the cooking at her restaurant, Taqueria Gael, in Andrews.
Crossing north five years ago was the easy part of her life’s journey, Hernandez says. Growing up in El Salto, a small, quiet town in the northern Mexican state of Durango, she worked long hours hawking street food and cooking in her parents’ restaurant. She opened her own business, a hot dog cart, as a teenager, and got married at sixteen to a husband who eventually became abusive, she says. Moving to Texas was, Hernandez believed, her way out. Once she arrived in the Permian Basin town of Andrews, she began to work at local food trucks and would feed fellow food truck employees home-cooked meals of sopa de fideo, chicken, and caldo.
One Christmas, she brought the workers a holiday meal of lengua, fries, and soup. It wasn’t much, but the six young men who had no family to spend Christmas with were delighted and thankful. “It’s one of my favorite memories,” Hernandez says. So it’s no surprise that when Hernandez visited Mexico for fifteen days, the workers in Andrews messaged and called her, pleading with her to return. To their relief, she did. Then, a year ago, she opened Taqueria Gael.
Until my recent trip, my experience with tacos in West Texas had been disappointing at best. Tex-Mex in general, and the burrito in particular, was where restaurants in the area shone—that is, until my visit to Taqueria Gael, a bastion of Mexican home cooking that stands alongside the best of Texas’s Mexican restaurants.
Advertisement
The same goes for the previous business that was located inside the yellow building that houses now Taqueria Gael, near the Andrews Highway. It was called La Morena and was owned by famed curmudgeon Greg Revelez. Back in 2020, the Tex-Mex joint was more of a community hub than a good restaurant. Not that it was bad—the Kitchen Sink Burrito, a smothered package of carnitas, refried beans, fries, and pearls of yellow rice topped with melted cheese and smothered in spicy brown gravy,was one of my favorite dishes of that year. Otherwise, the food was, with all due respect, forgettable. In other words, I didn’t expect such exciting and soothing comida casera (home cooking) in the oil patch town about 45 minutes north of Odessa, much less the matron behind the taqueria.
Taqueria Gael is a symbol of Hernandez’s resilience. Through her food, Hernandez shares with customers the traditions and craft passed down through the generations of women before her as well as through a life of extreme hardships.
Exterior of Taqueria Gael in Andrews.Photograph by José R. Ralat
Hernandez’s grandmother, Teresa, was a single mother of twelve children. To support her family, the matriarch, who could neither read nor write, sold menudo and other dishes she learned from her elders and passed on to her children and grandchildren. At twelve years old, Hernandez’s mother, Modesta, moved from Durango to Mexico City to work in a hospital. About a decade later, she returned to El Salto to work in Restaurante Anita. It was at the restaurant that she met her future husband. The two were immediately inseparable and married in eight days. To help provide for the growing household, Modesta opened a small restaurant, Comedor Valeria, in the family’s living room. She sold carnitas, chicharrones, gorditas, and, of course, the clan’s specialty, menudo.
Hernandez joined the family business as a teenager when she opened a hot dog cart, which she later expanded to sell carnitas. Soon after, her troubles with her husband started. Hernandez hadn’t known the kind of man he would become: a womanizing and abusive drug addict and alcoholic, as she describes him. She dealt with it as best she could, through work. “I promised myself that my children would never know cold or poverty,” Hernandez says.
Their first child, daughter Valeria, was diagnosed with epilepsy at three months old. To pay for Valeria’s treatment, Hernandez added tamales and buñelos to her street cart’s menu. Her daughter’s epilepsy disappeared at the age of four. Four years after that, Hernandez says her husband raped and impregnated her. She gave birth to a boy, Adrian. “My son is the product of abuse, but he is a blessing. He’s my baby,” Hernandez says with joy and pride in her voice. The young man is now studying information engineering, a field that blends computer science with math. “He is a man in every sense of the word. He is responsible. He is a man of his word. He isn’t lazy, nor does he drink or smoke,” Hernandez says.
In April 1998, Hernandez’s father passed away. At this time, violence was at a disastrously high level in Mexico. Her brother was kidnapped and eventually released. On another day, her husband said he was going to work and never returned. “I was left alone to raise my kids and work harder,” she says. Hernandez continued to add dishes to her cart’s menu. She did whatever she needed to do to provide for her family. She was also once more pregnant. To her anguish, the baby was stillborn.
Advertisement
As soon as she could, Hernandez began the paperwork for a visa to come to the United States. She knew however hard she worked in Mexico, it wouldn’t be enough to give her children the educations and futures she dreamed they deserved. The only option was to find work north of the Rio Grande. Finally, five years ago, she was able to settle in Andrews, where she eventually opened Taqueria Gael, named after her supportive, caring partner, whom she met while working at various food trucks in Andrews. Love and the gratitude for a better life are evident in every dish.
The tacos she serves are all tacos de guisado wrapped in soft, nixtamalized-corn tortillas that are made in-house. The green picadillo, stewed with tiny potato cubes, translucent chopped onion, and invisible but fiery chiles, was a delight. The asado verde—rough-chopped chicken blanketed in a dark green salsa—was even better and hotter. The asado rojo, plump with pork obscured by an inky red sauce, left me silent. My eyes closed, and I smiled. The barbacoa was a dark bramble peeking out from below freshly grated queso blanco. For the quesadilla, queso blanco is enveloped in a corn tortilla and cooked on the flattop until the cheese melts into a milky, stretchy consistency. It only took one bite for me to feel at home.
The pozole—deep red, almost clay-colored—was a bowl of guajillo chile–punctuated stew bobbing with tender, juicy bits of pork chop. It was a hot day when I visited Taqueria Gael, but as I recalled the voices of many women in my life, I remembered hot days are made for hot food. The small, round, Nutella-filled doughnuts, glazed and shiny in the midday sun coming through one of the restaurant’s windows, were so good. I wanted to eat them all lest I offend Hernandez, who brought them to the table herself. Alas, the stop at Taqueria Gael was one of several I had planned en route to the Panhandle. Otherwise, I would’ve lingered, asked for coffee to wash down the dessert, and likely consumed the whole plate of doughnuts.
The worst of Hernandez’s life is behind her. She has made peace with the past and how it has formed her, thanks to her children and her partner. She welcomes every customer like she’s welcoming her own children to eat. As trite as that sounds, the proof is in the amazing pozole. Eating it, I felt like I belonged in Taqueria Gael, like Hernandez was happy to see me enjoy her food. Hernandez expresses it better: “I have been able to overcome obstacles with food. Everything I cook, everything I do, I do with all my heart and with love.”