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San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro Has No Presidential Plans for 2016
San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro, considered the Latino rising star of the Democratic Party, told Efe here Friday that he will not seek his party’s 2016 presidential nomination.
“It’s flattering that my name is mentioned, but that will never happen,” Castro said when asked if he saw himself as the first Latino president of the United States.
The future of the Latino community and the nation are united “and we’re close to seeing one of ours as president,” the Texas politician said, while insisting he will not enter the 2016 primaries or seek the second spot on a ticket headed by presumptive front-runner Hillary Clinton.
Castro, serving his third term as mayor, became the center of attention when he spoke at the 2012 Democratic National Convention.
Since then his name has been bandied among Democrats as the possible successor to President Barack Obama in the White House.
Castro, in Chicago on Friday to speak at a breakfast organized by the Latino Policy Forum, said that Latino voters don’t need a Latino candidate to motivate them in 2016, “because we’re already motivated and in the last presidential election we showed our strength.”
He said that immigration reform – now stalled in the House of Representatives – will be very important in the coming elections because “we’ve begun to see political results based on the paticipation of the Latino voter.”
“Republicans have gone from demanding an electric fence on the border and describing immigrants in a demeaning way to seeking a compromise. That didn’t happen by chance, our community’s voting did it,” he said.
Despite resistance by the GOP-controlled House, Castro still sees the possibility of “a great immigration reform if a few Republicans support it.”
The demands for greater security on the border are “an excuse,” he said, noting that Texas border cities like El Paso, Brownsville and McAllen are “among the cities with the lowest crime rates in the country.”
Published in Latino Daily News
Source: http://www.hispanicallyspeakingnews.com/latino-daily-news/details/san-antonio-mayor-julian-castro-has-no-presidential-plans-for-2016/27910#When:19:36:03Z
