SAN ANTONIO (AP) – Democratic leaders are trying to prevent Maureen Galindo, a candidate who has repeatedly expressed antisemitic views, from winning their party\u2019s nomination in next week\u2019s Texas runoff, and they\u2019ve accused Republicans of propping up her campaign.<\/p>\n
Galindo faces Johnny Garcia in the runoff for the Democratic nomination in the state\u2019s 35th Congressional District, which is located in the San Antonio area. The district was redrawn by Texas Republicans to boost their party\u2019s chances of holding onto the seat in this year\u2019s midterms.<\/p>\n
Democrats have become alarmed since Galindo received the most votes in the March 3 primary. She earned 29% while Garcia had 27%. They believe the seat could remain competitive, despite redistricting, if their party has a strong year politically, and they\u2019re eager to avoid being saddled with a candidate\u2019s inflammatory rhetoric.<\/p>\n
The runoff comes at a moment of heightened concern about the spread of antisemitism across the political spectrum and questions about how to handle candidates with extreme beliefs.<\/p>\n
Galindo\u2019s comments included calls for imprisoning \u201cAmerican Zionists,\u201d and transforming a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility into a jail for that purpose.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019ll turn Karnes ICE Detention Center into a prison for American Zionists and former ICE officers for human trafficking,\u201d Galindo\u2019s campaign Instagram account said. It added: \u201c(It will also be a castration processing center for pedophiles, which will probably be most of the Zionists).\u201d<\/p>\n
Galindo is supported by a political action committee called Lead Left PAC that bills itself as opposed to President Donald Trump. However, Democrats argue that the group is funded by Republicans, and the New York Times reported evidence of potential links.<\/p>\n
\u201cHouse Republican leadership must immediately cease propping up this antisemitic candidacy,\u201d Democratic House Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chair Suzan DelBene said in a statement.<\/p>\n
The National Republican Congressional Committee did not address Democrats\u2019 claims about supporting the Lead Left PAC, but criticized the Democratic candidates for \u201cembarrassing fundraising numbers, zero grassroots energy, and no real support from Texans.\u201d<\/p>\n
In an email, Galindo said her proposal was \u201cNEVER for Jewish Zionists \u2014 it\u2019s for BILLIONAIRE Zionists.\u201d She said national Democrats sought to inflame her comments.<\/p>\n
Democrats have disavowed Galindo\u2019s language. In addition to DelBene and Jeffries\u2019 statement, Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, called it \u201cdisgusting\u201d and said it shouldn\u2019t be near \u201cour politics.\u201d<\/p>\n
Representatives Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey and Jared Moskowitz of Florida said in a statement Wednesday that if Galindo were to win election to Congress, they\u2019d force votes to expel her \u201cevery single day we are here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Garcia said in a video posted on social media that the comments have no place in the race.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe should be bringing people together, not spreading hate, division or dangerous rhetoric,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Lead Left PAC did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SAN ANTONIO (AP) – Democratic leaders are trying to prevent Maureen Galindo, a candidate who has repeatedly expressed antisemitic views, from winning their party\u2019s nomination in next week\u2019s Texas runoff, and they\u2019ve accused Republicans of propping up her campaign. Galindo faces Johnny Garcia in the runoff for the Democratic nomination in the state\u2019s 35th Congressional … Continue reading Democrats try to defeat candidate expressing antisemitic views in Texas runoff on Tuesday<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[182],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1508815","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-unassigned"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-05 21:15:08","action":"change-status","newStatus":"trash","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1508815","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1508815"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1508815\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1508816,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1508815\/revisions\/1508816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1508815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1508815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1508815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}