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Talarico Win Shows Democrats Can't 'Write Off Latinos Who Voted for Trump': Ex-Sanders Strategist
Democratic operative Chuck Rocha described Talarico as "a special candidate" who "ran the right kind of race at the right time."
Mar 04, 2026
James Talarico's victory in the Democratic US Senate primary in Texas on Tuesday shows why it would be a mistake to think Latino voters who jumped ship to support President Donald Trump in 2024 are a lost cause, according to Democratic strategist Chuck Rocha.
Rocha, who worked on Sen. Bernie Sanders' (I-Vt.) 2020 presidential campaign and who is a senior adviser for Talarico's campaign, told the Wall Street Journal that the Democratic Senate hopeful won over Latino support in Texas by focusing on a populist economic message first and foremost, such as when he accused US billionaires of "stealing from the American people, stealing the wealth that we created."
"Latinos are an aspirational people, and they want to aspire," said Rocha. "And they are also religious people, and they're... for economic populism."
The Journal noted that Talarico easily bested his rival for the nomination, US Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas), by roughly 27 percentage points in Texas counties whose populations are 60% or more Latino, including counties in the southern part of the state that were longtime Democratic strongholds that swung to Trump in 2024.
The lesson of the election for Democrats, Rocha told the Journal, is "don’t write off Latinos that voted for Donald Trump."
In a video posted on social media Wednesday, Rocha elaborated on how Talarico and his campaign secured the nomination, calling the Texas Democrat "a special candidate" who "ran the right kind of race at the right time."
The facts about how @TeamTalaricoHQ won last night pic.twitter.com/1IUd9VpPUh
— Chuck Rocha (@ChuckRocha) March 4, 2026
Beyond that, Rocha said, Talarico and his staff were simply relentless campaigners willing to seek votes wherever they could find them.
"He won because he showed up in communities," Rocha said. "He ran advertising in those communities. He had an amazing field team of 28,000 volunteers, over 600 community events in just eight weeks. They sent over 4 million peer-to-peer texts."
Rocha said that it was too soon to say whether Talarico's message meant that Latino voters were returning to Democrats more broadly, but added, "They will move back for James Talarico if you show up and give them a hopeful message."
Rocha's enthusiasm for Talarico was echoed by Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas), chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
"James Talarico is the future of the Democratic Party," Casar declared in a social media post. "He unites working people of all kinds to take on the billionaires who are making life unaffordable. He’s going to show Texas Republicans how powerful working people are when we stand together. On to victory in November."
Mark McKinnon, a one-time Texas political operative who has worked for both Republicans and Democrats, said in an interview with Politico that Talarico's victory would be an unwelcome development for the Texas GOP, which will have to work harder to defeat him than other prospective Democratic nominees.
"A perfect storm is lining up for Texas Democrats," McKinnon said. "They have a nominee who can appeal to moderates and soft Republicans. Talarico could be Moses who leads the Lone Star Democrats out of the desert they’ve been in for 35 years."
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Ahead of State of the Union Address, Progressive Caucus Leader Tells Trump: ‘We Need Our Money Back’
"Spare us the speech," said Rep. Greg Casar. "Pay up or shut up."
Feb 24, 2026
Now that the US Supreme Court has ruled President Donald Trump levied illegal tariffs on US businesses and consumers for more than a year, progressive Democrats are escalating demands that Americans get their money back.
Days after the Supreme Court shut down Trump's ability to unilaterally enact tariffs through the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Greg Casar (D-Texas) said on Tuesday that during the State of the Union address, Trump should announce refunds for Americans he unlawfully taxed.
"Americans don’t need a rambling, two hour lecture from Trump," Casar wrote in a social media post. "We need our money back. He owes us: $1,700 in illegal tariffs per family; $4 billion he’s profited off the presidency; $1 trillion he stole in tax breaks for the ultra-rich. Spare us the speech. Pay up or shut up."
Casar's demands for tariff refunds aren't isolated.
Politico reported on Monday that Democrats have pounced on the Supreme Court ruling to deliver a simple message to voters: Trump wrongfully took your money and should return it.
Rep. Steven Horsford (D-Nev.), who along with Rep. Janelle Bynum (D-Ore.) introduced legislation mandating tariff refunds on Friday, accused Trump of outright thievery.
"When someone takes money that wasn’t authorized and does it in a way that harms you," Horsford told Politico, "they’ve stolen from you, and that is what the Trump administration has done for the last year."
Horsford's rhetoric echoed a statement made by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who said in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling last week that Trump "illegally stole your money" and "should give it back to you" instead of trying to cook up new ways to slap tariffs on imported goods.
Groundwork Collaborative on Tuesday previewed Trump's State of the Union speech by noting the president has totally failed to keep his promise to bring down prices, adding that his tariffs "cost the average working family nearly $1,200 last year."
"No matter what Trump says in the upcoming State of the Union address," Groundwork Collaborative said, "it won’t change the fact that working families know that the president and his lackeys in Congress alone bear responsibility for painfully high prices and a dragging economy."
Although the Supreme Court clipped Trump's power to levy tariffs via the IEEPA, he has since announced plans to issue a 15% global tariff using his authority under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, which allows the president to levy tariffs to address “large and serious” balance-of-payments deficits with foreign nations.
However, as a recent analysis by the libertarian Cato Institute explained, any tariffs enacted through Section 122 expire after 150 days without authorization from Congress, which in theory could put vulnerable congressional Republicans on the spot to vote for or against the president’s signature economic policy this summer right before the 2026 midterm elections.
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‘You Should Be Outraged’: Candidates Sound Alarm on Stealth AIPAC Meddling in Illinois
"They’re using shell organizations to try to crush progressive candidates in secret," said the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. "We can’t let them get away with it."
Feb 18, 2026
Progressive congressional candidates in Illinois sounded the alarm Tuesday over efforts by AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobbying organization, to influence congressional races in the state using methods that appear designed to conceal its role as Democratic voters increasingly view the group as politically toxic amid the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
“This isn’t what Democratic voters want. Even AIPAC knows it, which is why they’re hiding their name behind a shady super PAC and their agenda behind whatever ad they think will poll best," Junaid Ahmed, who is running to represent Illinois’ 8th District in the US House, said during a press conference alongside other Democratic candidates.
On Wednesday, The Washington Post highlighted two organizations—with names that betray no association with the pro-Israel lobby—that "sprang into existence late last month" and waded into the Illinois congressional contests.
Elect Chicago Women and Affordable Chicago Now!, according to the Post, "appear to use vendors who have worked with AIPAC-affiliated efforts in the past."
"Elect Chicago Women uses a mail vendor that shares identifying information with a mail vendor used by AIPAC’s super PAC, United Democracy Project," the newspaper reported. "UDP’s vendor for phone banking also has the same address as the vendor listed by Affordable Chicago Now."
Illinois State Sen. Robert Peters, a Democratic candidate in the 2nd Congressional District, said AIPAC's efforts to obscure its involvement in the races amount to an admission of the lobby's growing unpopularity with voters across the US. A recent poll found that nearly half of Democratic voters in competitive congressional districts said they could "never" support a congressional candidate they knew was backed by AIPAC.
"So they’re trying to be slick and to use these shell organizations to be able to move money to support candidates who are willing to support the right-wing agenda," Peters said Tuesday.
Daniel Biss, a progressive running to succeed retiring Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) in the 9th Congressional District, decried the "millions of dollars in AIPAC-backed coordinated donations and dark money super PAC ads flooding each of our districts."
“We are here, united, as progressives to say that this kind of massive dark money barrage is exactly the kind of corruption we must stand against,” Biss said at the Tuesday press conference. “It is wrong for our party, wrong for our voters, and wrong for our city. Democrats will not let right-wing groups buy Illinois’ 9th District or any of these seats."
Watch the full press conference:
Drop Site and The American Prospect reported earlier this month that AIPAC "road-tested its stealth approach in a 2024 House primary in Oregon that pitted Susheela Jayapal, the sister of Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), against physician Maxine Dexter."
"Dexter raised relatively little money throughout much of her campaign, then saw a last-minute deluge organized by AIPAC coupled with outside spending through super PACs, which themselves turned out to be funded by AIPAC," the outlets noted. "The timing of the donations meant that there was no meaningful transparency before voters went to the polls, and Dexter expressed a mixture of ignorance and umbrage when her opponents suggested the money actually came from AIPAC."
In the Illinois contests, AIPAC appears to be using similar tactics, secretly funneling money to preferred candidates through super PACs with no outward affiliation with the pro-Israel lobbying group. The primary beneficiaries of the campaign cash, according to Drop Site and The American Prospect, are Laura Fine in the 9th District, Donna Miller in the 2nd District, and Melissa Bean in the 8th District.
Groups linked to AIPAC have so far spent an estimated $4 million in support of Miller, Bean, Fine, and Melissa Conyears-Ervin.
US Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas), chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said Wednesday that "if you care about the future of the Democratic Party, you should be outraged about what AIPAC is doing in Chicago right now."
"They’re using shell organizations to try to crush progressive candidates in secret," said Casar. "We can’t let them get away with it."
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