NASHUA, N.H. — He was an hour late, but after a long day of flight cancellations and traffic jams, former HUD Secretary Julian Castro arrived to a restless but spirited atrium of 150-200 people at Nashua Community College on Thursday night.
The large turnout on a weekday night in New Hampshire's second largest city provided yet another indication that Castro, boosted by a well-received debate performance last month, has climbed into the middle tier of candidates for the Democratic nomination.
"CNN is doing their live draw of the debate nights for July 30th and 31st so we're going to find about the next debate," Castro told the crowd as he took the stage. "I hope you watched the first one." The former HUD Secretary later read aloud the results of the live draw, which assigned him to the second night with former Vice President Joe Biden and California Senator Kamala Harris.
Although his most memorable moment of the first debate came when he challenged his fellow Texan, Congressman Beto O'Rourke, on immigration, Castro did not start with the issue. He instead organized his speech around his aspiration for the United States to become "the smartest, the healthiest, the fairest and the most prosperous nation on earth."
The four-part message was exactly what Jonathan Gourlay, a Peterborough, New Hampshire resident who described himself as "sold on Julian Castro" since the then-San Antonio Mayor delivered the keynote address at the 2012 Democratic National Convention, believed would eventually vault the first-time candidate into the top tier.
"He has to make people realize he's got a full platform," Gourlay, 60, said. He complained that "other candidates, fringe candidates" often limited themselves and became "focused on one thing," but called Castro "genuine" and "captivating." He hoped that the 44-year-old would "excite all the people who didn't vote in 2016."
After he outlined his plans for education, health care and criminal justice reform under the first three pillars, Castro finally addressed immigration under the fourth. He acknowledged that he has been vocal — "I haven't been shy" — and argued that Democrats should double down on the issue as a strategy to defeat President Donald Trump. "I think the best policy is not to run and hide and squirm and feel like we just can't do anything on immigration," he said. "No, we have to give the American people a strong, positive alternative."
Yet his discussion of immigration arrived nearly twenty minutes into his stump speech, wedged between considerations of housing and climate change. He also did not mention the specific provision that he challenged O'Rourke to oppose, Section 1325 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which makes "improper entry into the United States by an alien" a criminal rather than a civil offense.
If Castro did not emphasize immigration in Nashua, he devoted almost four minutes near the top of his speech to education. He said he and his twin brother, Texas Congressman Joaquin Castro, "are proud products of the public schools of Texas" and joked how they later attended Stanford University and Harvard Law School "together, because I couldn't get rid of my brother."
His plan for the country included everything from universal pre-K for three- and four-year-olds to a teacher tax credit to special needs education. He also defended tuition-free public university and community college as "not a radical idea" and echoed Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, who attended the University of Houston for $50 a semester, when he detailed the history of tuition costs in Texas. "Folks will tell you that in the 1980s, 1970s, it was $50 or $100," Castro said.
The former HUD Secretary also demonstrated his expertise on housing, an issue that he said was connected to education, job opportunities and health care. He explained that the subprime mortgage crisis led to one of the lowest homeownership rates in forty years and drove people into an already tight rental market.
"Here in Nashua, y'all have seen rents go through the roof," he said. "What I think you're seeing is more and more people over the years who can't find housing that's affordable in Boston have moved out farther and farther and farther in this state."
Earlier in the speech, Castro responded to "the remarks the president has made both in person and on Twitter" as evidence that "we're living through a moment right now," comparable to earlier times in American history when politicians said "go back to Africa" or "the Irish need not apply." A candidate with a mostly relaxed and even-keeled delivery, he raised his voice in opposition to these politicians. "Everybody counts in America," he said to a round of applause.
Castro, who is not a native Spanish speaker, closed with a line that landed with a laugh at the first debates on a night when several non-Hispanic candidates stumbled through responses in Spanish. "I know that on January 20, 2021, we're going to say adios to Donald Trump!"
This work is made possible by the Russell H. Bostert Memorial Fellowship at Williams College.
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