Bobby Pulido, a moderate Democrat and Latin Grammy Award-winning Tejano singer, won his House primary race on Tuesday in South Texas, fending off a candidate running to his left, according to The Associated Press.
Mr. Pulido will go on to challenge Representative Monica De La Cruz, a Republican, in the November midterm election.
“I’ve spent my life bringing people together through music,” Mr. Pulido said after he won the nomination. “Now we’re bringing people together to win — to fight for lower costs, better jobs, and respect for our community.”
Mr. Pulido beat Ada Cuellar, an emergency room doctor who challenged his center-left views on abortion and his connections to the Democratic establishment. The competitive primary race became a proxy for whether voters wanted to elevate a centrist who traditionalists say can win socially conservative voters or swing to the left at a time when the wind is at Democrats’ back.
“We didn’t get the result we wanted tonight, but we built a movement that will last far beyond this primary,” Dr. Cuellar said Tuesday night. “We sent a strong message to the establishment: The compadre system is under notice.”
Ms. De La Cruz, who favors President Trump’s tough immigration laws and other conservative views, will be tough to beat in the oddly shaped 15th Congressional District, which juts from the border some 250 miles straight north, to the outskirts of San Antonio. Republicans in the State Legislature redrew the district’s lines to bolster its tilt toward the G.O.P.
Ms. De La Cruz first flipped the seat in 2022 after more than a century of Democratic control, further eroding Democratic power in a Latino-majority district and helping Mr. Trump secure victory in that part of the state in 2024.
From the start, Mr. Pulido appeared to be the Democratic Party’s favorite, amassing a number of high-profile endorsements and visiting all 11 counties in the district. Mr. Pulido’s more moderate views in a heavily Roman Catholic and socially conservative region won him a plurality of Democratic voters.
He supports a secure border but opposes agents going after otherwise law-abiding immigrants. He wants to expand health care, especially to those in poor or rural communities where people often have to drive long distances to find a hospital. And he wants to do away with some tariffs that hurt industries like agriculture.
Dr. Cuellar poured a lot of her own money into her campaign and promised voters to work to legalize abortion, expand access to health care to all and push for federal immigration authorities to confine enforcement actions to criminals. She also had the endorsement of Jasmine Crockett, a Democratic firebrand running for the party’s nomination for Senate in Texas.
Over the summer, Republicans in Austin drew their new maps on the assumption that their party’s gains with Latinos would be replicated in future elections, but recent polls indicate Hispanic voters may be moving away from their party. Democratic victories last fall in New Jersey and Virginia were powered in part by a return of Hispanic voters to the party.
Edgar Sandoval covers Texas for The Times, with a focus on the Latino community and the border with Mexico. He is based in San Antonio.
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