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By Daniel Borunda

First-year U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar rose to become one of the most impactful national voices from the border as El Paso faced a difficult year in 2019.

Escobar, who made history as one of the first two Latinas in Congress from Texas, was outspoken against what she saw as dangerous anti-immigrant rhetoric and policies from the Trump administration. She also played a role in the third presidential impeachment in the nation's history.

2019 was a hard year for El Paso, dealing with the arrival of unprecedented numbers of migrants and the unspeakable horror of the Walmart mass shooting.

"This past year has been far more challenging than I ever imagined it would be because it was a challenging time for our community," Escobar, an El Paso Democrat, said in an interview this week with the El Paso Times.

Escobar joins readers' choices of Khalid and first responders who saved lives in the Walmart mass shooting as the El Paso Times pick for Newsmaker of the Year for 2019.

A Texas freshman in Congress

Escobar was sworn into the 116th Congress on Jan. 3, 2019, in a House of Representatives with a record number of women and racially diverse lawmakers.

In November 2018, Escobar and Sylvia Garcia of Houston became one of the first two Latinas from Texas elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.

In Congress, Escobar was elected to a freshman leadership post by the House Democratic Caucus' freshman class and selected an assistant whip for the 116th Congress.

She also was named to the House Armed Services Committee and House Judiciary Committee, which are respectively tasked with overseeing military installations and issues including immigration and border security.

“The fact that she’s been so quickly integrated into the Democratic plan makes her an obvious star in the emerging Democratic leadership from Texas,” said Brandon Rottinghaus, a University of Houston political science professor. 

The Texas freshman was instrumental in getting dozens of members of Congress to visit El Paso as the border continues to deal with a myriad of concerns linked to Trump administration border policies amid an influx of asylum-seekers from Central America, Cuba and other parts of the world.

The large number of migrants strained U.S. Customs and Border Protection staffing and resources, filled migrant shelters and had volunteers scrambling to help migrants released by U.S. authorities.

Wait times at El Paso's international border crossings reached a 10-year high with the shifting of CBP staff and worries grew over the health and treatment of detained migrant children and families as well as policies that keep asylum-seekers waiting in Mexico.

Escobar's office pointed out that she worked to secure funding for El Paso, including supporting the National Defense Authorization Act, which included a 3.1% pay raise, the largest increase in a decade, for military service members and 12-weeks parental leave for federal employees.

Her office also  resolved 446 cases for constituents seeking Social Security and other benefits worth more than $550,000.

Changes to border policies

Immigration is an area that's put the El Paso congresswoman in the national spotlight, Rottinghaus, the University of Houston political science professor, said. 

"I think part of the reason she became kind of a shining star nationally was that she was able to highlight some of the atrocities that were taking place at the US-Mexico border, because this is her community and its close to her heart," he said.

Debate over immigration policies will continue but Escobar pointed out that there have been some improvements over the past year.

Relationships built in those Congressional visits to El Paso helped lead to CBP's creation of new civilian jobs to handle the processing and care of migrants at the border, Escobar said.

The new civilian positions should ease some of the stress on CBP agents, Escobar noted.

"I think that it will make a remarkable difference," she said.

Escobar sponsored a bill passed by the House in September to create an ombudsman within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to improve transparency and handle complaints against border enforcement agencies. The proposal is pending in the Senate.

Escobar says she is having conversations with CBP Commissioner Mark Morgan to give nonprofit migrant assistance groups, such as Annunciation House in El Paso, a presence at processing centers allowing for a more efficient connection between asylum seekers and sponsors in the U.S. after they are released after processed by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

El Paso-area temporary shelters usually host migrants for up to 48 hours while the migrant's sponsor gets them a bus ticket to continue their destination in another part of the United States.

Before serving as a main witness at a House Oversight and Reform Committee on migrant child separation this past summer, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi sang her praises in a New York Times article.

“She’s a person who listens to other people; other people listen to her,” Pelosi told the New York Times. “She’s quite a spectacular member of Congress.”

Fernando Garcia, founder and executive director for Borderland for Human Rights, said Escobar had been a "national face" on the fight for human rights.

“No other member of Congress representing El Paso has done so much to bring about oversight and accountability to ill-conceived and abusive border enforcement strategies as Congresswoman Escobar did in just one year," Garcia said. "She was able not only to bring the voices of border communities to Washington, but she led the US House of representatives in passing HR2203, a unique border legislation that promotes vision, human rights, community engagement and necessary oversight for border enforcement institutions.”

Trump impeachment

Sitting on the House Judiciary Committee, Escobar played a role in the impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump, Rottinghaus said.  

“She’s been a Democratic weapon,” Rottinghaus said. “She’s not afraid to take on the Trump administration and her questions have been very pointed in the impeachment saga.

The House Judiciary Committee was tasked with drafting the articles of impeachment, which now goes to trial in the Senate. 

Impeachment was "really a very tragic circumstance" but as a separate branch of government, Congress is responsible for "keeping the president in check," Escobar said.

"When the president abused his office and put our election in peril we had to act," Escobar said.

Escobar pointed out that she was elected El Paso County judge in the wake of corruption scandals that saw previous County Judge Anthony Cobos sent to federal prison.

"We were outraged as a community. We were outraged," Escobar said regarding local public corruption. "The FBI was at work. Our local journalists were at work.

"This is no different (but) it is more egregious because it is coming from the president instead of a county judge, a school board member or a county commissioner. It’s the same outage that I felt," she said.

El Paso Walmart shooting 

During an August break from Congress, Escobar planned to spend the month at community meetings and coffee-talk "cafecitos" with constituents in El Paso.

On that Aug. 3 Saturday morning, Escobar was having a community meeting at Coronado High School that was abruptly ended as word spread of the Walmart shooting. 

"It's still really hard to talk about, coming into August we had a one month recess. I was going to be home for a month. We planned to have town hall meetings and cafecitos."

"The month ended up very different," she said, her voice cracking with emotion. "I spent a lot of time at funerals, hospital bedsides and hospital waiting rooms talking to families trying to provide comfort when I could."

The "domestic terrorist" who allegedly drove nearly 600 miles to target Mexicans in El Paso is an example of the danger of heated rhetoric over immigration and the border, Escobar said.

Escobar said that one of the frustrations for her and other El Pasoans is people outside the community misrepresenting the "border community (as) unsafe, uncivilized, as a place that need to be contained, that poses a threat," she said.

"Those portrayals are not only offensive and untrue and they are harmful," she said.

"I think it’s very important to stop the hysteria around immigration. It’s used for political purposes. It’s meant to divide us. It’s meant to inspire hysteria and fear. We need immigration reform rooted in facts and rooted in American values."

The Walmart shooting "is an event that we will move past and that I know we will put it behind us, but it is truly an event that will impact us forever," Escobar said.

"We have to use that tragedy as an impetus for change. We can’t be silent in the face of hatred. We can’t be silent in the face of racism."

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