Texas Democrats worry Biden debate performance could hurt down-ballot races

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WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden’s unsteady performance at Thursday’s presidential debate has sparked a wave of anxiety among Texas Democrats, some of whom fear their party’s standard bearer could drag down the rest of the ticket and cost Democrats down-ballot seats in November.

Even Biden’s allies and supporters in Texas acknowledged the debate was a disaster. The president, who hoped to quell concerns about his acuity and fitness for office, routinely struggled to muster up complete sentences and often wove multiple points together, muddling his message. The performance overshadowed the debate’s substance, including former President Donald Trump’s support for rolling back abortion rights and refusal to disavow the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol — issues where Texas Democrats hope to seize the upper hand this fall.

“Biden had a very low bar going into the debate and failed to clear even that bar,” former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro said on social media. Castro, a former San Antonio mayor, faced Biden in the 2020 Democratic primary. “He seemed unprepared, lost, and not strong enough to parry effectively with Trump, who lies constantly.”

State Rep. Ron Reynolds, a Missouri City Democrat who will be a delegate at the Democratic National Convention, called for Vice President Kamala Harris to replace Biden as the nominee. Reynolds, who chairs the Texas Legislative Black Caucus, wrote on social media that he was "VERY disturbed" by the debate and shared a screenshot of an op-ed headline that argued Biden's "mental capacity is an election issue."

Two-thirds of debate viewers polled by CNN after the debate said they thought Trump outperformed Biden, though only a small fraction of those who backed Biden before the debate say they would now consider voting for Trump.

Statewide polls show Biden trailing Trump by a wider margin than at any point in the state four years ago, and Democrats worry that a further slip could torpedo their chances in key races, including U.S. Rep. Colin Allred’s challenge to U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz and several GOP-controlled state House seats they are targeting. The fate of these largely unknown down-ballot candidates is closely linked to their party’s success atop the ticket, where presidential nominees are more visible to everyday voters and have far more money to drive turnout.

“I think that if you are a down-ballot candidate in a swing area, that candidate's responsibility for turnout becomes even bigger than it was before yesterday,” said Ed Espinoza, a Democratic strategist who previously oversaw the progressive group Progress Texas. “You're gonna need an extra push.”

Allred’s campaign and social media was silent throughout the debate. The Dallas Democrat declined to comment after leaving the U.S. House chamber on Friday, saying he was still “processing” the debate.

U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, an El Paso Democrat who serves as a national co-chair on Biden’s campaign, said “it was not the night any of us wanted.” Still, she expressed more dismay that reporters were not further challenging Trump’s comments about migrants coming from prisons and asylums, which she described as “beyond vile.” Escobar said she still had confidence that Biden could counter Trump’s remarks in the future.

U.S. Rep. Marc Veasey, D-Fort Worth, acknowledged that Biden underperformed, but warned members of his party to be cautious before declaring the president’s reelection effort dead.

“I don't think members should say anything that they will regret later before everybody's had a chance to just kind of chill a little bit,” he said.

Congressional Republicans, meanwhile, delighted at Biden’s debate performance, immediately using it to target Democratic congressional candidates who had endorsed Biden’s fitness. The National Republican Congressional Committee didn’t hesitate to unearth an old quote by Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez of McAllen, where he said Biden was “healthy, he’s sharp, he’s a full package.”

“Vicente Gonzalez has supported Joe Biden every step of the way – in his open border and inflationary policies and now as Biden mentally struggles to do the job as president,” former U.S. Rep. Mayra Flores, who is challenging Gonzalez for the 34th district, said in a text message. “Now is not the time for feeble leadership from Biden or blind yes men like Gonzalez.”

Biden’s age could be particularly effective among Hispanic voters, who are on average the youngest ethnic group in the country, said Giancarlo Sopo, a Republican media strategist. The only U.S. races targeted by national party groups are in majority Hispanic districts in South Texas.

“It just confirmed what all Americans already know: that he is a feeble man not able to perform the duties of his position,” said U.S. Rep. Monica De La Cruz, R-McAllen, who is facing a competitive challenge from Democrat Michelle Vallejo to keep her seat in the 15th district.

Republicans are hoping to flip two U.S. House district seats this year in South Texas — the 34th and the 28th districts — and are investing heavily to hold onto the 15th district. National Democrats are also showing early interest in the Senate race in Texas for the first time in decades, identifying the state as their most likely flippable seat in a largely difficult map for Democrats this year.

But Democrats retort that their congressional candidates don’t tie themselves closely to Biden anyway. U.S. Reps. Henry Cuellar, a Laredo Democrat in the 28th district, and Gonzalez both routinely vote against their party, voting with Republicans on issues ranging from the border to energy regulation. Allred voted for a Republican resolution condemning Biden’s handling of the border, though he later reversed course on a similar resolution.

In Harris County, where Republicans have gained recent momentum after losing political control, GOP Chair Cindy Siegel said her party would do everything it can to tie Democrats to Biden’s most glaring weaknesses, from inflation to immigration. Siegel also predicted that Trump would “help us succeed and win our down-ballot races” — a striking change in posture from just four years ago, when Biden carried Harris County by 13 points over Trump.

“I fully expect that [Trump’s] going to do a lot better than he did back in 2020,” Siegel said, arguing that national polls showing stronger support for Trump among Black and Hispanic voters would be borne out in Harris County’s diverse pool of voters.

Siegel's counterpart, Harris County Democratic Party Chair Mike Doyle, said the "Democratic brand" remains popular in Texas' largest county and "is only going to grow more compelling as we head into November." Many of Harris County's Democratic law enforcement leaders, judges and other local officials are up for reelection in the fall.

"To those who say that President Biden might drag down these great candidates, I would point to the delivered promises on infrastructure, protecting our interests abroad, and standing up for basic human rights for decades," Doyle said in a statement.

Democratic state lawmakers and legislative candidates stayed largely silent throughout Thursday's debate, mostly resharing other posts that called out Trump’s repeated falsehoods and criticized the debate format for letting said falsehoods run unchecked. State Rep. John Bucy of Austin, one of the few Democrats in the Legislature who said anything during the debate, wrote that Trump, in claiming credit for the demise of Roe v. Wade, was “directly responsible for Texas’ extreme abortion ban.”

Abortion rights are perhaps the leading issue for Texas Democrats up and down the ballot, including at the Texas Supreme Court, which has upheld the state’s abortion bans. A political group called Find Out PAC is targeting three GOP justices over the issue, highlighting the court's move to reject a Dallas woman's request to obtain an abortion for a nonviable pregnancy that her doctors said threatened her health and future fertility.

The PAC’s leader, former Under Secretary of the Air Force Gina Ortiz Jones, expressed optimism in the wake of Biden’s poor performance, citing Trump’s abortion comments.

"Last night, we saw why Texans should be alarmed, motivated, and optimistic about ousting Texas Supreme Court Justices Jimmy Blacklock, John Devine, and Jane Bland,” Jones, a former Texas congressional candidate, said in a statement. “Trump brags about eliminating Roe, but these justices are more extreme. They’ve shown that medical exceptions can exist on paper, but not in reality.”

Nothing new

Though Texas is a national priority for U.S. House and Senate races this cycle, the Biden campaign has not put much focus into flipping the state. Texas voted for Trump by 5.6 points in 2020, and Biden remains deeply unpopular in the state.

Espinoza, the Democratic strategist, said the lack of national investment — and the possibility of an unpopular president dragging down the rest of the ticket — is nothing new for Texas Democrats.

“It’s not like ​​there have been a ton of coattails to ride in years past,” he said.

Gonzalez said he expected to overcome GOP attacks by touting his record over four terms in Congress.

“The problem with [Republicans’] strategy is people in my district know me well, and tie me to $9 Billion dollars in Federal funding I’ve delivered, funding that has created jobs and is transforming South Texas infrastructure, healthcare & education,” Gonzalez said in a text message. “And they tie [Flores] to the fact that she was a 5 month special election fluke that embarrassed South Texans by not offering a single bill or proposal that would improve lives and not delivering a single dollar in resources during her short tenure.”

The collective Democratic panic has led to questions about whether Biden should remain at the top of the ticket. On his podcast Friday, Cruz, who characterized Biden’s performance as an “old man on his front porch screaming get off my front porch,” theorized former First Lady Michelle Obama could be tapped in a last minute salve for the Democrats.

The party still hasn’t officially named its nominee. If Biden does step down, party delegates would determine their pick at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August.

Biden, who said he had a sore throat during the debate, attempted to assuage concerns at a campaign rally in North Carolina on Friday. Appearing considerably more alert and using a more forceful tone than during the debate, Biden said he would not be running unless he firmly believed himself capable of the job.

A campaign spokesperson for Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-San Antonio, said the North Carolina rally was a "much stronger reflection of the leader Americans have seen over the last three and a half years. The dynamics last night were not favorable, and the president was clearly taken aback by the extent that Trump was willing to lie about his record in front of a national audience."

"I don't walk as easily as I used to. I don't speak as smoothly as I used to. I don't debate as well as I used to. But I know what I do know. I know how to tell the truth,” Biden said to the crowd. "When you get knocked down, you get back up."

Disclosure: Progress Texas has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

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