In early November, Rochelle Garza, a former civil liberties attorney, decided to run for Texas Attorney General, an office that Republicans have held for 30 years.
The former American Civil Liberties Union attorney who sued the Trump administration on behalf of a teenager who was involuntarily separated from her parents, and who testified against the justice who ruled against her at his Supreme Court confirmation hearing, is now a political novice.
In October, Republican lawmakers in Texas unveiled new maps that increased the number of majority-white Republican districts and diminished the power of communities of color, which accounted for 95 percent of the state's population growth.
The Democrat who represented that district, Vicente Gonzalez, ran in the home turf of the Republican who was elected. The U.S. Department of Justice sued Texas over the maps.
The man decided to try and get a bigger job.
She told Insider that she reached the decision after she found out she was pregnant.
It's more personal. I think a lot about what the future holds and what's at stake for democracy, civil rights, and the Constitution. The news that she and her husband were pregnant strengthened her conviction that abortion is a healthcare issue between a person and their doctor. I don't think anyone understands pregnancies unless they have gone through it. "That is a lesson learned from everything that is happening to my body."
The outgoing Attorney General of Texas, Greg Abbott, is seated next to the new Attorney General of Texas, Ken Paxton.
Robert Daemmrich Photography Inc/Corbis is a company.
She says that she can't imagine what her clients were going through because of choice.
The Texas attorney general has been at the forefront of conservative and right-wing policy priorities.
The Attorney General of Texas, who is in his second term, has fought against vaccine and mask mandates, and defended the state's recent abortion law.
After Greg Abbott became Texas governor, Paxton took office. For the past six years, Paxton has faced felony fraud charges, but has not yet faced trial.
The 'Garza Notice' was written by Jane Doe.
In the summer of 2017, Garza represented a teenager who was seeking an abortion while in government custody. The teen was refused to be released by U.S. Health and Human Services to undergo the procedure.
The judge ruled in favor of Jane. The panel of judges at the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the government, but when the full appeals court heard the case, the side of the government prevailed.
The Texas attorney general argued to the Supreme Court that immigrants have no right to abortion.
One of the judges who ruled against Garza was also the one who argued for access to "a new right" for illegal immigrants. Trump nominated a Supreme Court justice the following year.
The client underwent the procedure. TheGarza notice is a government policy for notifying pregnant teens in shelters and detention centers of their rights to abortion services and regulations in the context of Texas' restrictive abortion ban.
The Senate Judiciary Committee heard testimony from a woman who helped a teenage girl fight for an abortion.
Scott Applewhite/AP Photo
The Supreme Court is considering the abortion cases of teenage immigrants and that's something that connects her work with them.
The erosion of rights begins with the most marginalized. She was someone who the Trump administration, Ken Paxton, and the Supreme Court justices did not think she mattered, and that her rights did not matter, but they did. If we don't protect her, what chance is there for the rest of us?
The Supreme Court ruled on Friday that abortion providers can challenge the Texas law, which is considered the most restrictive in the nation.
A women's full pursuit.
An article from a recent Politico article suggested that the party's base may not be galvanized unless abortion rights are completely overturned.
Voters are more focused on issues of employment and healthcare, and wealthy people in states that have blocked abortion access will be able to travel out of state for services.
On the day the Supreme Court heard arguments in a challenge to Mississippi's abortion law, Garza disclosed she was pregnant. The Mississippi case could lead to the overturn of the Supreme Court's decision on abortion, because the Texas law placed the onus on private citizens.
Mississippi's Attorney General wrote that the precedent protecting abortion was out of date.
"Many women and mothers have reached the highest levels of economic and social life without the right endorsed in those cases," said Fitch. Sweeping policy advances now promote women's full pursuit of both career and family.
The governor of Texas signed a bill banning most abortions on May 29, 2021.
The images are of Sergio Flores.
Mississippi's argument seems to be embodied by Garza. She has used her legal practice to get into politics. All while pregnant.
In his view, individual success doesn't mean that the right to reproductive care or persistent systemic inequalities are erased. Expansion of access to healthcare, child care, and family leave are all things that go hand in hand with abortion rights.
Texas has one of the highest rates of uninsured and children living in poverty. The maternal mortality rate is higher than the national average. The state legislature extended Medicaid coverage to six months after a state committee recommended it.
At the confirmation hearing, she said that her client, Jane Doe, was alone and completely under the control of the federal government.
They have the confidence.
The daughter of two teachers, Garza hails from a poor county in Texas. Her father was a state district judge. Her great-grandmother was a country doctor who was informally trained to attend to people living on nearby farms.
At the ancestral house where red chili plants bloom in the front yard and pomegranates grow from the vine, Jesus Reyes Garza searches for a thread about the women in his family, and says matter-of-factly, "legends."
She views the entrenched structural inequalities that transfer power into the hands of the few as the root of her campaign.
The candidate's uncle is Jesus.
Vernica G. Crdenas is a reporter for Insider.
Only one Latina has ever held statewide office in Texas, and she was appointed.
Latinas who want to run for office in Texas are more likely to be unsuccessful than women of color.
Politics experts say that Latina Democrats who run for office must overcome a host of obstacles, including from their own party, in order to be successful.
"Democratic party leaders may not coalesce around a candidate of color out of fear of alienating white voters," writes Kira Sanbonmatsu, a senior scholar at the Center for American Women and Politics.
Texas Democratic consultant, James Aldrete, places Garza among the small but growing ranks of Latina maverick candidates that also includes Harris County judge Lina Hidalgo, who unseated a veteran incumbent to become the administrator of a county that includes Houston.
No one recruited her. She is a great talent, said Aldrete. It will take courage to change things in Texas.
There are differences in age that can make it difficult for Latina voters to support a Latina candidate.
Some of this is reminiscent of the civil rights era, when Latinas were expected to volunteer with grassroots causes while the men ran for political office. She said that when they meet older generation Latinas they often get asked who is taking care of their children. The younger Latinas are ready. They have law degrees. They are missing support and structure.
Rochelle Garza is in Texas talking to voters during her congressional campaign.
Eric Gay/AP Photo.
There is only one woman and one Latina in the Democratic primary. She is expected to face off against the mayor of Galveston, Joe Jaworski, who launched his campaign a year ago, and the civil rights attorney who represented the family of Ahmaud Arbery, a Black man who was murdered by white vigilantes in Georgia.
Right-to-life groups have sounded the alarm about Garza's candidacy, but he is probably the least well-known. Emily's List supports candidates who back abortion rights.
Eva Guzman is a former justice of the state supreme court. She has billed herself as a tough law enforcement officer who has a life history of being an immigrant. Bush, the Latino son of former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and the nephew of George W. Bush, the former president and Texas governor.
The author of a report on Texas Latinx Republicans says the party has expanded its Latino constituency by sidestepping issues of inequity to appeal to aspirational and pro-business sentiment. He said that the Republicans never talked about the racial impact of policy.
The disparity has been made more apparent by her pregnancy. The pregnant women were working at the ice cream shop. She thought about the issues of access to health care, family leave, and child care that affect both class and race.
"We expect women to have children, rear children and maintain jobs," said Garza. We don't expect the Attorney General of Texas to be harmful to women and that's why we have laws that are.
