Ruben Gallego, the Democrat senator-elect from Arizona who narrowly defeated Republican Kari Lake one week ago, is changing his tune.
During an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Gallego acknowledged that Democrats were too quick to ignore actual economic
“Look, I think really the economy is what resonated with people. And that’s what I heard in Arizona a lot. People were worried about the cost of everything. And I think some of the frustration was that we were spending money, but not necessarily helping people. And that’s also — ” Gallego began before host Jake Tapper cut him off.
“Spending money like in Ukraine, you mean?” Tapper asked.
“Yes, exactly. And part of my frustration was, we would love nothing more to help you out, but also, we don’t have the votes from Republicans. But even getting to that discussion starts going down a long conversation. The biggest lesson we have to learn here is, when people are hurting economically, they’re going to take care of themselves first. And that’s what we have seen for the last — change elections for the last 20 years. And I think it’s important for Democrats to remember that from now on. You have to take care of people at the bottom line. You have to give them some level of economic security, especially Latino men. Latino men believe they can work themselves out of any problem. Like, I remember growing up, when I didn’t have enough money to travel back home for Christmas, I just went and worked extra hours,” Gallego said.
Tapper jumped in and asked, “When you were a Marine?”
“When I was at school. And so I would — I literally went to a convention center and threw on a costume and handed out leaflets, right? That’s the mentality of Latino men,” Gallego said.
“This election — I’m sorry — this time is the first time I’d ever heard many of them say, ‘I just don’t feel like I’m doing anything to provide for my family. I don’t feel like I’m bringing them security.’ Until we actually focus on that and understand that, we’re going to have problems really bringing them back into the Democratic fold,” Gallego said.
In the interview, Gallego continued by blaming Harris’s poor performance with Latino voters, namely, on the party’s reliance on “people from the same backgrounds”—Ivy Leaguers—including the hiring of consultants to create messages targeted at the Latino population.
“I think a lot of politicians didn’t want to hear what was actually happening out there,” Gallego said. He pointed out that his campaign pushed early on border security and economic issues.
WATCH:
Following their devastating failure on election night, Democrats are still in chaos.
The party lost the Senate, failed to recapture the House, and saw the Harris campaign lose seven battleground states to President-elect Donald Trump.
Polls that showed the race was closer and even leaning toward the vice president compounded the blow to party insiders.
Biden and Harris supporters have been trading blame for the loss in the days since. Many supporters of Harris (and some who have no stake in the outcome) have accused the president of continuing to run after it became clear to many that he would lose to Trump.
Obama White House official Jon Favreau, host of Pod Save America, stated on his show that after his dismal debate performance in June, Biden’s campaign internal polling showed that Trump would have won with 400 electoral votes if Biden had stayed in the race.
Meanwhile, Harris’ team has come under fire from Biden supporters for the startling amount of money the campaign spent over its more than 100 days in office.
Despite raising $1 billion, the campaign is still limping after the election with millions of dollars in debt.
