Why Jeffries and other top Democrats are heading to red states
Semafor ·
The aspiring future speaker wants to neutralize the Republican redistricting maneuver — but he has subtler goals, too.
SAN ANTONIO — Johnny Garcia asked Hakeem Jeffries to join him here in deep-red Texas to help flip a GOP seat. After the midterms, the House Democratic leader may need Garcia even more.
Jeffries can win back the majority without the former deputy sheriff, who’s trying to prevail next week in a district that President Donald Trump won by 10 points in 2024. But a Garcia win could prove essential to Jeffries for two other reasons: to prove that Trump’s mid-decade congressional redistricting has backfired, and to create a Democratic majority that’s easier to govern.
Cracks in the GOP redistricting maneuver are showing in other red states, too — a top party super PAC has pulled out of Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz’s reelection race in Florida after making his district redder. Yet Democrats’ hopes of neutralizing the Trump power play are particularly strong in Texas, where Republicans initially dreamed of gaining five House seats.
That’s thanks to two Democratic incumbents running more strongly than expected in more conservative districts, but also to candidates like Garcia, who’s running neck-and-neck against his GOP rival. Garcia is also making clear that he’d be a reliable vote for Jeffries — in a potential speakership race, at least.
The New York Democrat has “been doing the tough work in the minority, and obviously him coming down to San Antonio is indicative of just how much this race is that important to us winning back the House majority,” Garcia told Semafor. “I’m going to stand with our leader when he is sworn in as the speaker for the US House of Representatives.”
Jeffries may face a fractious progressive base ready to challenge his leadership even before he claims the House’s top gavel. But purple-district candidates like Garcia don’t see him as the type of polarizing figure that his predecessor Nancy Pelosi had become even before the 2018 midterms.
GOP attempts to turn Jeffries into a similar liability for Democratic candidates this year haven’t panned out (nor have Democratic bids to hitch Republicans to Speaker Mike Johnson). Garcia is one of several swing-seat candidates with no problem backing Jeffries.
In fact, Garcia asked Jeffries to come for the conventional reasons that would please any aspiring future speaker: for the attention he draws and the fundraising clout he brings.
“I just said, ‘Our community needs you here in San Antonio. They would love to see you.’ He said, ‘Say no more. I got you,’” Garcia recalled onstage, speaking before Jeffries during Sunday service at Calvary Baptist Church. He and Jeffries were touring churches in the majority-Hispanic, roughly 6.6% Black 35th Congressional District , which Garcia hopes to win.
On the trail, Jeffries and Garcia talked less about their relationship. They preferred to focus on cost-of-living issues and the party’s aggressive pushback to GOP redistricting; in Garcia’s own primary, the party intervened in Garcia’s primary to ward off a win by a candidate accused of antisemitic remarks.
“One of the most important reasons why we’re here, in terms of the failed effort by Texas Republicans and Donald Trump and MAGA extremists across the country to rig the midterm elections by gerrymandering the congressional map, is that we’ve had great civic leaders like Johnny Garcia make the decision to step forward and run,” Jeffries told reporters after the church service.
Voters in majority-Hispanic districts like the 35th and several in South Texas moved to the right in 2024. But Democrats are confident that Trump’s sagging approval numbers, and a backlash to his aggressive immigration enforcement among Hispanic voters, will drag down Republicans this year.
Garcia is embracing centrism, telling Semafor that the Biden administration “got it wrong on the border” and that Trump managed “calm on the border with the border crisis,” despite creating more problems with heavy-handed enforcement.
He later sidestepped a question on “Medicare for All,” before adding that “folks in this district are just completely fed up, and we’re going to see on November 3rd this gerrymander turn into a dummy-mander.”
Republicans still think they can win the district and the other redrawn districts in Texas. “Texans don’t need Hakeem Jeffries to tell us how to vote,” GOP nominee Carlos De La Cruz said in a statement: “The families I talk to every day are asking how to afford groceries and keep their neighborhoods safe. That’s what this campaign is about.”
Texas and Florida aren’t the only states where Democratic leaders are highlighting a potential GOP remapping misfire. The party’s House campaign chief, Rep. Suzan DelBene, D-Wash., will be in Ohio this week to campaign with Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Ohio, and to attend a fundraiser for Rep. Emilia Sykes, D-Ohio, according to a DelBene spokesperson.
Ohio Republicans redrew Kaptur’s seat this cycle, but Democrats are bullish on her chances.
Garcia’s support would help Jeffries weather possible turbulence on his path to the speakership, but it’s not a given that the left flank of the caucus will mount a rebellion at the scale of the conservative backlash that stripped Kevin McCarthy’s gavel.
Progressives like Melat Kiros have signaled their votes for Jeffries might be up for grabs unless their leadership embraces more left-leaning policies, but most Democrats are skeptical about major defections.
And some red-state Democrats are still keeping their distance from national party leaders. Tejano musician Bobby Pulido, who’s running in a Texas district that Trump won by 18 points in 2024, told Semafor that — though he’s gotten many offers — he didn’t want visits from national Democrats besides Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., whom he called a “friend of mine.”
“I love Hakeem, but you’ve got to understand, the people here have become disillusioned with both parties,” Pulido said.
In many ways, Jeffries’ posture on the trail is a microcosm of his party during these midterms. Democrats are gaining traction in red states and increasingly rebuilding a national brand shredded after the 2024 election, but there’s more ground to regain voters’ trust.
If he can make it to the speakership with few speed bumps, likely with the help of centrists like Garcia, Jeffries and his generation of House Democratic leaders will have a bigger challenge. They’ve had the luxury for four years of governing from the minority, where they’ve found unity in opposing Trump and congressional Republicans.
Winning means making much tougher decisions about what to put on the floor.