Can Julian Castro Help Bring Out the Latino Vote for Hillary Clinton?

The 40-year-old secretary of Housing and Urban Development is often mentioned as a possible running mate for the Democratic front-runner.

Julian Castro, secretary of U.S. Housing and Urban Development (HUD), speaks during a House Financial Services Committee hearing in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Wednesday, Feb. 11, 2015.
Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg

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By Margaret Talev

June 10, 2015 at 9:50 AM UTC

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As Julian Castro waited backstage Tuesday morning at the Clinton Global Initiative conference in Denver for his panel on “The Map of Making it in America” to begin, a fellow panelist struck up a conversation with him in Spanish.

Lucas Benitez, co-founder of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers and an activist for farmworkers in Florida, said they talked mostly about farmworkers’ challenges and housing issues. They also touched on the 2016 presidential contest, just long enough for Benitez to say that he hopes if Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee she taps Castro as her running mate, and for Castro to demur, “Thank you so much.”