Latino House Republicans are building out campaign infrastructure to protect their members and grow their numbers, at times directly competing with their Democratic counterparts, who have a huge head start.

Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-Texas) is leading efforts to elect more GOP Hispanics to the House through the Hispanic Leadership Trust (HLT), a PAC launched in 2022 to grow the Congressional Hispanic Conference.

HLT, which has dispensed $1.3 million to House Republicans so far this cycle, is supporting Reps. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (Ore.), Juan Ciscomani (Ariz.), David Valadao (Calif.), John Duarte (Calif.) and Monica De La Cruz (Texas), as well as Gabe Evans, a member of the Colorado House of Representatives running against Rep. Yadira Caraveo (D-Colo.).

“The Hispanic Leadership Trust is a dozen current Hispanic members of Congress, and in many cases, you cannot grow an organization if you're losing market share, right? So step one is always making sure that the members come back. We're talking really solid, very productive members,” Gonzales told The Hill.

In some cases, HLT-supported lawmakers and candidates are up against Hispanic Democrats backed by Bold PAC, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) campaign arm.

Bold PAC is a relatively small operation compared to the big leadership PACs, but in the Latino campaign space, it is the 800-pound gorilla.

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