Beto O’Rourke is angry.
Once the candidate who promised to unify a deeply polarized country, after a mass shooting in his hometown of El Paso, Texas left 22 people dead, O’Rourke began to look at his campaign differently.
“When that AK-47 came in after he ordered it, his mom calls the police in Allen, Texas where they lived, and she asked, ‘What the f**k does my son need with an AK-47?'” O’Rourke told an audience at an event in Roxbury, Massachusetts Thursday night.
Since the shooting, O’Rourke has made gun violence a prominent part of his platform. He also has pledged not to take part in the typical presidential pageantry, only campaigning in places not normally frequented by presidential candidates. So he came to reliably blue Massachusetts Thursday.
Despite O'Rourke's unusual campaign path, the majority of attendees who WGBH News spoke to at an event at a Roxbury brewery Thursday evening had mixed feelings on his presidential ambitions.
O’Rourke's spotlight on gun control gave focus to a campaign that was on the downturn. When O’Rourke first announced his intention to run for president in March, he raised more money in 24 hours than any other candidate at the time, and only trailed former Vice President Joe Biden and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in polling. Now, he’s near the bottom. According to recent poll averages published by RealClearPolitics, of the 10 candidates who will debate next week in Houston, O’Rourke is only polling higher than Sen. Amy Klobuchar and former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julian Castro.
At the event in Boston Thursday, the former Texas congressman doubled down on his commitment to end gun violence, calling for stricter gun control and saying that the root of the recent wave of mass shootings that have terrorized the nation is President Donald Trump and his rhetoric.
“That racism, that violence in this country [is] alive and well [and] given permission to act by a president who, during his administration, has seen hate crimes on the rise every single one of the last three years,” O’Rourke said. “The day that he signed the Muslim ban ... the mosque in Victoria, Texas — in my home state — was burned to the ground.”
To some, it showed that O’Rourke has matured as a candidate from his 2018 Senate run.
Samantha Casas, a 19-year-old college student who volunteered for his Senate campaign, said that while she believes he’s become a stronger candidate in the last few weeks, she’s still not sure if O’Rourke has what it takes to be president.
“Beto has a good strong appeal on what Texas can be, but whether or not he’s that for the whole U.S., I don’t know,” Casas said.
Others at Thursday’s event also had mixed feelings about O’Rourke. While many praised the Texan for his inspirational ideals, they also felt that his time may be better used running again for the Senate in 2020.
“Honestly, I thought he should run for the Senate [before tonight] and I still do,” said Maya Mudgal, a 23-year-old student at Northeastern University. “I think he’s a really engaging speaker, I agree with a lot of the policies he has, I just think he would be really, really effective in the Senate.”
O’Rourke has firmly committed himself to the presidential race, and has previously said he “will not in any scenario run for the United States Senate.” That has not stopped many from hoping that he will reconsider. Nadia Holder, a Northeastern student who attended Thursday’s event, said she is “baffled” as to why O’Rourke is in the presidential race, and that his expectation of winning is unrealistic.
“I think Beto would be a great senator. He clearly loves the people of El Paso and Texas and people love him back there,” Holder said. “Based on what he was saying tonight, he had so much to say about his people, and I think he would make a great advocate for them in the Senate.”
On Thursday, O’Rourke appeared to be competing with someone who wasn’t in the room: Sen. Elizabeth Warren. Several in attendance said that while they admire O’Rourke, they thought Warren would make a more effective leader.
“She’s been at it for a really long time. She knows what she’s doing, and I feel like she really knows the job and can do it,” Holder said.
Others were more blunt.
“I’m here because [Warren] is not,” Jessica Imbro, 23, said. “Truthfully a lot of what I’ve seen from [O’Rourke] is kind of not wanting to take a stance on certain issues and I think if he had a harder left [position] I’d be more inclined to take him seriously.”
Warren’s supporters in the audience pointed to the senator's fusillade of policy proposals that kicked off a policy arms-race between the candidates. O’Rourke, however, has struggled to catch up. During his speech on Thursday, a protester jeered at O’Rourke and demanded he be specific about what he would do to combat issues such as rising healthcare costs, climate change and gun violence.
O’Rourke has, though, become more policy-focused recently. On healthcare he has endorsed a House bill titled “Medicare for America,” which is a moderate reform of the existing Medicare program. In April, he unveiled a plan to spend $5 trillion to invest in clean energy research and infrastructure. Most recently, he rolled out a sweeping gun control plan that, among other reforms, calls for a ban on assault rifles, the closing of the gun show loophole and the implementation of a national buyback program.
Yet when asked about how to pass his gun control legislation through a Republican-controlled Senate, O'Rourke hesitated before coming up with a response.
“They have kids as well. They fear for their safety when they go into school. They know we are losing people to gun violence at a frightening rate in this country,” O’Rourke said. “We may not agree on every aspect of my policy, but there’s enough common ground there to give me some faith that there’s also the political will and the public sentiment to produce the pressure on the Republican majority that we have in the Senate, or to change that majority into a Democratic one.”
Despite attendees' hesitance about O'Rourke's qualifications for president, many did say they see a future for the former congressman. Adeline Bee, a member of the Massachusetts Democratic State Committee, said that while she has not decided who she will vote for, she’s been impressed with O’Rourke.
“I’m looking for a team to beat Trump, and I think Beto may be part of that team,” Bee said. “He seems to be an honest person. He seems to be very much for people, and the little man as well. He’s willing to walk the walk and not just talk it. So, we’ll see what happens.”
