EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas, says she expects to be named co-chair of Kamala Harris’ presidential election campaign.
“I got a call (Wednesday) from the campaign, and they told me to be on high alert, that she is going to try to call me today or tomorrow and that she is going to be asking me to remain as co-chair of her campaign,” Escobar said Thursday in a Zoom meeting with reporters.
President Biden last year named Escobar as one of seven national co-chairs for his reelection campaign, which he suspended last month after several gaffes and plummeting approval ratings.
Vice President Harris appears poised to claim the Democratic Party nomination at the national convention later this month in Chicago and is shoring up her campaign facing a tight timeline. She has retained Biden’s campaign manager, Julie Chavez Rodriguez, and Campaign Chairwoman, Jenniffer O’Mally Dillon, as her own.
“I’m looking forward to having that conversation with the vice president I stand ready to continue to travel to battleground states on behalf of her campaign and whoever she names as her vice president,” said Escobar, who represents El Paso. “I will do whatever possible to make sure that we retain the White House in November, and we flip the House of Representatives and that we retain the Senate.”
Escobar began serving in the House of Representatives on Jan. 3, 2019, after winning Texas’ 16th Congressional District the previous November. She has been re-elected twice since then. She currently serves in the House Armed Services, Judiciary and Ethics committees.
And she is co-author of The Dignity Act along with U.S. Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar, R-Florida. That’s a bipartisan immigration reform bill filed last year that includes legalization provision for undocumented immigrants as well as new mandatory employer verification of their workers’ employment eligibility status.
“I can tell you (Harris) knows that the path through the White House runs through Latino communities. And as a very important Latino community in the United States, I do want her and President Biden to come back to El Paso,” Escobar said. “But we have a very limited window to win those battleground states. I don’t’ know if it’s likely before the election. But I do hope once she wins the nomination she will very quickly come back to the community.”
Harris visited El Paso in 2021 when President Biden tapped her to help him cope with a humanitarian migration crisis at the Southern border. Harris toured Border Patrol facilities in El Paso and met with migrant advocates. Republicans criticized her as ineffective on immigration and continue to do so.
In November, Escobar faces Republican Irene Armentdariz-Jackson, who challenged Escobar in the previous two elections.
Read: Read More