EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) – U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas, officially launched her re-election campaign with a private event on Wednesday evening, April 16.
Escobar is seeking to serve her fifth term as the congresswoman representing Texas’ 16th Congressional District, according to her office.
During the event, Escobar spoke about a wide range of topics such as social security, immigration, healthcare, national protests, voter registration, and more.
Among the issues specifically impacting the Borderland, Escobar addressed the issue that organizations and groups that help migrants with legal services are facing, as they are being terminated.
“Our community, for decades, has been a support to people who have arrived at our nation’s front door. We have organizations, for example, like Annunciation House, they celebrated its 40th anniversary last year. So obviously, this has been a long-standing, ongoing issue, this is the border. But they have largely depended on volunteers and donations.”
However, Escobar assured that migrant crossings are very low, and there is no population to serve.
“Now we are seeing numbers of crossers at historic lows. So right now, there really is not a population to serve per se. But we also know this is cyclical. And we’ve seen numbers drop, we’ve seen numbers increase. We don’t know what the future holds, it depends on the president’s relationship with Mexico because, frankly, a lot of the success is a result of what Mexico is doing. A lot of President Trump’s success on migration is what Mexico is doing, so it could change at any time. But what, unfortunately, is no longer available is the federal support,” Escobar said.
Escobar also expressed her opposition to how Fort Bliss is playing a role in the immigration policy.
“Using our military installations for mass deportations should be unacceptable to everyone. And in fact, it should be most unacceptable to supporters of the military because it degrades our readiness, it degrades our personnel, it takes their focus off their mission, and we need our U.S. military to focus on their job and mission,” Escobar said.
Escobar added that the Trump administration is using Pentagon funds to fund a lot of these polices, and that puts national security at risk.
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