Texas Democrat candidate James Talarico attacks Biden on border, contrasting with past remarks
A new campaign ad features Talarico criticizing President Biden's border policies, but unearthed comments show he previously advocated for redirecting the state's entire border security budget to education.
Texas Democratic U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico is adopting a more moderate stance on border security, criticizing President Joe Biden in a new campaign advertisement released Monday. The ad features Talarico stating, "I called out Joe Biden for failing us on the border."
However, Talarico's past statements reveal a different perspective. In a 2019 interview with The Austin Chronicle, Talarico proposed redirecting Texas' entire $800 million two-year border security budget toward public education. "I'd rather take that money and put it back into public education and help increase the basic allotment, for instance," he said at the time.
During that same interview, Talarico also described border enforcement funding as "political grandstanding" and stated, "Putting a bunch of boats, planes and border patrol agents on the physical border is expensive and also does not solve the problem."
Despite these earlier comments, Talarico has positioned himself as a "border security" Democrat during his current Senate bid. His campaign spokesperson, JT Ennis, told Fox News Digital that Talarico "supports stronger border security and immigration enforcement" and has called for more border patrol agents, emphasizing that the focus should be on arresting and deporting violent criminals and human traffickers, not families.
Ennis also stated that Talarico "is proud to be the only candidate in this race who has unveiled a border security agenda endorsed by Republican and Democratic border county sheriffs."
Talarico, a former Texas state legislator and teacher, has previously faced scrutiny for comments on immigration enforcement, including calls to dismantle Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and referring to undocumented immigrants as constituents. He also labeled Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott's border security policies as "atrocities."
Recently, Talarico was absent from the campaign trail for a period, leading to speculation about his whereabouts. He later stated he was recovering from the flu.
Talarico is running against Republican Ken Paxton for the Senate seat in Texas. The race remains competitive as the November midterms approach.