Brownsville native Diego Zavala has officially announced his candidacy for the 34th congressional district seat currently held by U.S. Rep. Filemon Vela, D-Brownsville, who announced he would not seek re-election.
Zavala ran against Vela in the 2020 Democratic primary, receiving 9,707 votes to Vela’s 39,484.
In 2020 he ran a 100% people-funded campaign, garnering nearly $10,000 in donations. In his announcement on Facebook, Zavala said his “grass roots campaign will be funded by the people and for the people, and I will say no to all special interests money.”
Zavala is the assistant principal of Operations at IDEA Public Schools.
“As a son of immigrants, I learned the weight of hard work. It was through great sacrifice that I stand here today,” Zavala said in his political announcement. “It was in my political science studies that I became aware of the vastness of inequity in our country. Hoping to be an agent of change, I pivoted into the classroom, convinced that education was the greatest equalizer.
My M.A. in international development from American University made it clear to me that, while education was important, it was only a single spoke on the wheel of development. Education meant nothing without healthcare, healthcare meant nothing without security and security meant nothing without education.”
He went onto say “Realizing that my home community needed an advocate for these fundamental human rights, I moved back to my hometown to try and push for big systemic change that would improve the lives of my family, neighbors, and friends. Currently I serve as the founding Vice Principal of a school in an underserved community devoted to reaching equity through education.”
