Mayor finds a new team to play on
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, a former co-chairman of the Hillary Rodham Clinton campaign, energetically stumped for the New York senator until she was shown the door.
Now, as one of the nation’s most prominent Latino politicians, he has become the go-to guy for Barack Obama, the presumed Democratic nominee, on Latino issues.
Villaraigosa is scheduled to introduce Obama when he speaks to Latino community and political leaders this afternoon in Washington, D.C. Obama invited the mayor to introduce him at the national convention of the League of United Latin American Citizens, better known as LULAC, where he will be a featured speaker.
It’s the second time this week that the Obama campaign has called on Villaraigosa to help in its aggressive outreach to Latino voters who favored Clinton in the primaries.
When McCain went on the air with a Spanish-language radio ad that criticizes Obama for just discovering the importance of Latino voters, Villaraigosa fired back, praising Obama as a champion of Latinos.
-- Phil Willon
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