Republican attorney launches long shot bid to unseat Roybal-Allard

Immigration attorney C. Antonio Delgado says he can beat Downey’s longtime Congress member.

C. Antonio Delgado has announced his candidacy for California’s 40th congressional district. 

A Republican currently residing in Los Angeles, Delgado will take on the long-established incumbent Lucille Roybal-Allard, who has held a seat in Congress since 1992 and represented the 40th District since 2013.

He hopes to serve as an alternative to what he called “The Roybal dynasty.”

“The incumbent has been there almost 30 years,” said Delgado. “Her father was in that district before her.

“I realized that these poor people of the 40th District at least need a choice for someone new. When I saw that there is no real viable candidate that can actually win in that district, I decided to get in with two days to spare to the deadline to actually get on the ballot.”

The 41-year-old is a single father and immigrant from El Salvador. He is an immigration attorney by profession, having received his education from UCLA and Thomas Jefferson School of Law.

He says he’s had no background in politics before the current race.

“There is no viable candidate in that race,” said Delgado. “When you look around and you ask yourself, ‘Why doesn’t someone do something?’ The reasonable question you need to ask yourself is, ‘Why am I not doing something?’. That’s why I decided to get in.”

Along with his own investment into his campaign, Delgado says his funding comes from individual donors.

As opposed to candidates before him, Delgado hopes to gain victory from the position of the “center right.”

“The opposition that [Roybal-Allard] has had so far is from the left. The last election, the person who ran against her was a Green Party [candidate],” said Delgado. “The other people that have run against her in the general election in the past few years have been people from the left, which I feel that moderate Democrats or Republicans would not be comfortable voting so far left.”

He adds that he feels Roybal-Allard is “incredibly vulnerable.”

“She seems to be absent from the community; everywhere I go people don’t seem to know who she is,” says Delgado. “I think I have an opportunity to show these people in the community that I’m a better option because she’s had almost 30 years; her destiny is set already. Whatever she’s going to do, she’s done it.”

Delgado is running on the platform of ending corruption, parent choice in education, and immigration reform.

On his views of education, Delgado says that he would like to give those in the district the opportunity to choose where their children go to school.

“This is not only going to incentivize public education to be more competitive, by realizing that if they don’t change what they’re doing they’re going to lose their students,” said Delgado. “The way that I’m thinking about doing it is advancing a voucher system, where parents get $12,500 a year per individual child, and that child doesn’t have to be an American citizen, they can be undocumented because the school is going to educate an undocumented student anyway. Those $12,500, they can take them wherever they want – a charter school, a private school – they choose where they take their children, and whatever money doesn’t get used gets put in a savings account for those kids in order to have something to take in the future.”

Delgado added that this would not be “new money,” but a return of funds “already invested in those children.”

On immigration, Delgado says he wants to give those who have contributed an opportunity at citizenship.

“As an immigration attorney, I see the need that our people have when it comes to being able to become citizens,” said Delgado. “I want to give the young people who have grown up here in the United States an opportunity to live the American dream; that’s only going to happen if they have some sort of path to citizenship.”

At a time where there are nationwide discussions on police department reform, Delgado said that the question should be about “efficiency” and not funding.

He says that a solution begins with leadership and dialogue.

“During the protests in Downtown, I attended a prayer vigil for George Floyd between the religious community and the police, and I think it starts there,” said Delgado. “It starts with dialogue. As an elected official, you have to have the courage to talk to the people who are maybe going to scream and yell at you. It starts with that; it starts by elected officials taking some sort of leadership.”

He added that he wants to support officers, while also not protecting “bad cops.”

“As far as defunding or funding the police, officers put themselves at risk every day. Sometimes these officers work very long hours. Officers have to make really life changing decisions when they’re tired…so I want to make sure that the officers have the support they need in order to be the best officers possible,” said Delgado. “But I also want to make sure that the police is held accountable if there is officers that are not actually serving their community.”

Delgado can be found on cantoniodelgado.com, on Facebook, and Instagram.