Mark Schiefelbein/AP Photo
Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) speaks during a hearing of the Homeland Security Subcommittee of the House Committee on Appropriations, April 10, 2024, on Capitol Hill in Washington.
When Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) faced a primary challenge two years ago from progressive Jessica Cisneros, the Democratic leadership closed ranks. They held fundraisers for Cuellar, recorded robocalls for him, appeared at rallies in his district, and took every possible opportunity to nudge Cuellar, a Blue Dog who voted against Democratic priorities on several occasions, across the finish line. After a recount, he ended up winning by only 289 votes. It’s plausible that the establishment money and support made the difference.
The leadership justified standing behind the only anti-abortion Democrat in Congress by saying that only he could win that district in South Texas, which Joe Biden took in 2020 by seven points. A progressive would be too risky in TX-28, at a time when the House majority would come down to just a few seats.
The thought of risk never came up in reference to Cuellar, even though, just a few months before that 2022 primary, the FBI raided his house as part of a corruption investigation involving business ties to Azerbaijan. At the time, The Intercept did a long report on Cuellar’s ties to Azerbaijani oil executives.
Cuellar and his attorney insisted there were no legs to the investigation, and that he was innocent. And the House leadership backed him up, dismissing any possible legal jeopardy.
Cuellar has now been indicted on 14 counts by the Justice Department, along with his wife, for taking $600,000 in bribes, one from a state-owned oil and gas company in Azerbaijan. (The other bribe came from a Mexico-based bank.) In exchange, Cuellar allegedly agreed to use his powers as a member of Congress to influence foreign policy involving Azerbaijan, as well as pressure bank regulators for favorable policy toward the Mexican bank. The couple is also accused of laundering the bribe payments through shell companies owned by Imelda Cuellar. They face up to 204 years in prison if they get the maximum sentence on all counts.
After appearing in federal court in Houston today, Cuellar maintained his innocence. “Before I took any action, I proactively sought legal advice from the House Ethics Committee, who gave me more than one written opinion, along with an additional opinion from a national law firm,” he said, adding that his actions were “consistent with the actions of many of my colleagues and in the interest of the American people.”
The court case will play out over years; the court of public opinion is another matter. Cuellar has already won the Democratic nomination for Texas’s 28th Congressional District; this year he ran unopposed. Candidates can withdraw from elections in Texas in a timely manner, but with Cuellar pronouncing himself innocent, and with his seat in Congress a potential bargaining chip for any settlement, it’s unclear whether he would withdraw.
That makes it somewhat likely that Democrats will be running an indicted public official in TX-28 this year, when they had every opportunity to toss him out of office two years prior, with the explicit knowledge of the possibility of a corruption scandal. The Democratic leadership lined up in his favor instead, and now this seat—which as everyone has said is not a slam dunk—is clearly in play for Republicans to flip.
Control of Congress will likely be so razor-thin that any one seat could be the difference between Democratic and Republican control. So the wall of establishment support for Cuellar in 2022 could plausibly lose them Congress in 2024, precisely the disaster they claimed to be attempting to avoid by backing the now-indicted congressman.
Waleed Shahid, a former spokesperson for Justice Democrats when they supported Cisneros over Cuellar, told the Prospect: “The Democratic Party establishment chose to wholeheartedly side with a corrupt, anti-choice Democrat rather than let the progressives grow their ranks by just one member.”
“Pelosi Has Endorsed Me”
High-level Democratic support for Cuellar in 2022 went beyond a pro forma endorsement. The Prospect reported from San Antonio when Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC), then majority whip, appeared at a get-out-the-vote rally with Cuellar almost exactly two years ago. The blessing from House leadership was one of Cuellar’s main selling points at the rally: “Pelosi has endorsed me. Steny has endorsed me. Clyburn has endorsed me,” he boasted.
Clyburn acknowledged at the rally that “I don’t agree with Henry Cuellar on everything,” but that clearly didn’t matter enough to withhold his support. Neither did a leaked Supreme Court draft in the Dobbs case, which eventually overturned Roe v. Wade. In 2021, the House of Representatives passed legislation that codified Roe, the Women’s Health Protection Act, and Cuellar was the only Democrat to vote against it. At the time, Democratic leaders were all running on abortion as a signature electoral issue.
Beyond abortion, Cuellar was a malign force in the Democratic caucus throughout Joe Biden’s first two years. He voted against the PRO Act that would make it easier to join unions. He demanded the delinking of the infrastructure bill from the Build Back Better Act, which almost doomed both measures. He urged the maintaining of the Title 42 policy that barred immigrants from crossing the border, at the time at odds with the Biden administration.
Steny, which refers to former House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, actually endorsed Cuellar the same day as the FBI raid on his house. Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi also endorsed, and according to Prospect reporting, Cuellar also received re-election support from three political firms approved by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the House Democratic election arm. Pelosi and Clyburn did robocalls for Cuellar in the election, which went to a May runoff that he won by a tiny margin.
Today, the new Democratic leadership, after Pelosi, Hoyer, and Clyburn stepped down, has to run statements like the one House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) made today through a spokesperson: “Like any American, Congressman Cuellar is entitled to his day in court and the presumption of innocence throughout the legal process. Pursuant to House Democratic Caucus Rule 24, Congressman Cuellar will take leave as Ranking Member of the Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee while this matter is ongoing.”
But the electoral fallout cannot be contained. Neither party has such an advantage in the House that even one seat can be sacrificed in November. Democrats saddled with an indicted congressman in TX-28 can easily be the margin of victory.
Some would say that incumbency dictated the Democratic leadership’s decision to back Cuellar. But The Intercept reported today that pro-Israel interests expect to spend $20 million or more to dislodge both Reps. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) and Cori Bush (D-MO) from Congress, without much resistance from House leaders.
“The glaring discrepancy in the Democratic Party’s responses—rallying behind Henry Cuellar to fend off a primary challenge while showing minimal effort in shielding progressive incumbents from AIPAC today—underscores their selective enforcement of unity,” Shahid said.
