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WASHINGTON — After outperforming Kamala Harris in South Texas on Election Day despite being vastly outspent by Republicans, U.S. Rep. Vicente Gonzalez, D-McAllen, has a message to his fellow Democrats in Congress. Actually, he has a few of them.

No. 1: Don’t tell him how to handle his business, he’s going to represent his district the way he knows is best. And No. 2: Clean up your own act.

In a recent interview with The Texas Tribune, the four-term Democratic congressman, with a penchant for going rogue, took a shiv to the Democratic playbook. He said the party’s fixation on abortion this cycle was “lazy” and out of touch with his majority-Catholic district. He urged the party to, in some cases, soften its defenses of transgender rights, even if that means voting against the Democratic base. He said Democrats had insufficiently attacked Republicans on economic issues. And he said the Democrats were plagued with “incompetence” in gauging the driving issues for voters in districts like his.

“Their messaging is off. I also believe their polling is off. Democratic polling has been consistently off beyond the margin of error for the last two or three cycles,” Gonzalez said in his Capitol Hill office. It’s “incompetence, at the end of the day. I think they need to get rid of people.”

Gonzalez won his competitive South Texas district — which runs from the Mexican border in Brownsville to Corpus Christi along the Gulf Coast — by less than 3 percentage points this year, fending off Republicans’ biggest offensive effort in the state. He outperformed Vice President Kamala Harris, who lost to President Donald Trump in every county in his district.

Gonzalez is one of the most conservative Democrats in Congress, at times voting with Republicans on issues related to energy and the border. He caused House Democratic leadership headaches as he pushed back on President Joe Biden’s climate and infrastructure agenda before eventually supporting the legislation, citing concerns it would negatively impact his district’s energy interests.

Gonzalez said his ability to see the social conservatism of his district and knowing when to break from the national party helped preserve his place in Congress.

“I told the entire caucus, don’t ever try to whip me again because I know my district better than anybody in this room,” Gonzalez said. “Having me 97% of the time is better than having my opponent 100% of the time. We need to give that leeway, especially to frontline members. Nobody knows our districts better than us.”

Republicans poured millions of dollars into supporting their candidate, former U.S. Rep. Mayra Flores, this cycle, viewing Gonzalez’s proclivity for off-color comments — including comparing Latino Trump supporters to “Jews for Hitler” in March — as a major vulnerability.

The race was among the most expensive U.S. House races in Texas this year. Flores, who previously represented the district for a few months in 2022 after winning a special election, spent over $5.7 million in the race as of mid-October.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the House Majority PAC, the party’s two biggest outside spending groups for House races, spent over $1 million with ads supporting Gonzalez.

But Gonzalez has serious issue with the way both groups operated in his district. Neither group responded to requests for comment.

Gonzalez said it was an error to focus so heavily on abortion in a region that is overwhelmingly Catholic. He said the strategy showed congressional Democrats “don’t know the region and they get lazy about it,” leaning on the issue because it was salient in the 2022 midterms. Abortion was a central issue in TV ads aired in his district to help him by national Democrats, which Gonzalez said was out of touch with voters more concerned about the rising cost of living.

The ad “was hitting my opponent on abortion in an 80% Catholic community. Somebody needs to get fired for that,” Gonzalez said. “Whoever was the decision maker to do that in South Texas should be gone, because they clearly don’t know the district.”

Gonzalez saw some room for abortion to be an effective element to a winning strategy, but he said the messaging should be targeted on digital platforms to young women rather than blasted on television ads. Gonzalez still went after Flores on abortion when the two shared a debate stage in October.

Gonzalez said Democrats focused too much on TV ads generally in Texas and should have spent more time door knocking and talking to voters.

Gonzalez also lamented that Democrats don’t have a winning strategy to counter anti-trans attacks that Republicans used through the latter part of the cycle. The National Republican Congressional Committee and Sen. Ted Cruz’s reelection campaign both poured money into ads attacking Democrats as wanting to use taxpayer money to fund gender transitions for children and to allow boys to play in girls sports. Democrats and LGBTQ+ rights activists denounced the ads as spreading dangerous misinformation about trans youth.

Gonzalez was among the few Democrats to tackle the ads head on, issuing his own counter ad rebuffing the Republicans’ claims, saying he never supported tax-funded sex changes. He said more Democrats should feel comfortable following his lead, even if it leads to pushback from the progressive base.

“I think we need to protect every community in America,” Gonzalez said. “But there are issues that I don’t agree with, like boys and girls bathrooms, or boys competing in girls sports, and I think we should be outspoken about it. I don’t think Democrats should have to hide from a message like that.”

Gonzalez has supported pro-trans legislation in the past, voting in 2021 for the Equality Act, which would protect trans people from discrimination.

Republicans are poised to continue their attacks on transgender rights, emboldened by voter response to their ads nationwide. And Democrats are already being confronted with the issue as the first transgender member of Congress, Rep.-elect Sarah McBride of Delaware, is set to be sworn in in January. Republican Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina introduced a bill that would ban McBride from using the women’s bathrooms or locker rooms in the Capitol complex.

When asked if he would vote for Mace’s bill, Gonzalez said: “That’s a very, very tough conversation that needs to be had by Democrats. And I think at the end of the day, we got to vote our district and vote what we really believe. And I don’t believe that boys should be in girls’ bathrooms.” He did not specify how he would vote on the bill.

McBride has agreed not to use women’s restrooms and stressed she does not want her gender to become a distraction. All members of Congress have private bathrooms. She did not respond to a request for comment on Gonzalez’s remarks.

Gonzalez said Democrats should have invested in attack ads targeting Republican candidates who want to cut Social Security, Medicare, and Title I funding for schools in low-income communities, as Republicans have cast Democrats as supporting measures to defund the police. South Texas Republicans deny they want to cut funding for the programs.

Gonzalez also suggested he was not impressed with Democrat Michelle Vallejo’s campaign, who challenged U.S. Rep. Monica De La Cruz in the 15th Congressional District. She lost both in 2022 and 2024, by double digits despite support from the DCCC and investment from the House Majority PAC. She ran in 2022 on a progressive platform, focusing on reproductive rights and expanding access to health care. She moderated her tune this cycle, but was unable to close or even shrink the gap.

Gonzalez said the district needs a moderate Democrat to win. “It’s a tough district, especially for somebody who initially campaigned as a progressive. It’s kind of hard to turn the clock back,” Gonzalez said.

Still, Vallejo made positive strides. She outperformed Harris in her district by seven percentage points. Vallejo declined to comment.

Gonzalez formerly represented the 15th Congressional District for six years before switching to the 34th district in 2022 following redistricting. Then-DCCC Chair Sean Patrick Maloney preferred Gonzalez, a well-funded incumbent, stay in the more competitive 15th District to give Democrats a better shot at holding onto all of their South Texas seats, Gonzalez said. But Gonzalez defended the move, saying his home was drawn into the new 34th district and he had to prioritize his own race.

Gonzalez is optimistic that Democrats can continue holding on to South Texas despite the heavy investment from Republicans, saying Republicans have a “low quality of candidate,” including Flores and De La Cruz.

De La Cruz, who outperformed Trump in her district, shot back at Gonzalez’s comments in a statement. “It’s funny he’d say that, considering I chased him out of this district and he’s underperformed in the last three elections,” De La Cruz said. “He can focus on pettiness — I’ll keep picking up his slack and delivering results for South Texas.”

Gonzalez called Flores’ victory in a 2022 special election a “fluke,” saying she got elected solely because Republicans poured millions of dollars into a special election that national Democrats did not pay much attention to.

“We welcome Vicente Gonzalez’s self-delusion as the ground shifts underneath him. Donald Trump romped across South Texas, ” said Delanie Bomar, a spokesperson for the National Republican Congressional Committee, House Republicans’ campaign arm. “It’s only a matter of time before those same voters toss Gonzalez from office, too.”

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