Latest news with #RioGrandeValley
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
GOP veteran to challenge Democrat Vicente Gonzalez in South Texas congressional district
Eric Flores, a Republican Army veteran and lawyer from Mission, announced Monday he is running for Texas' 34th Congressional District, targeting Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez of McAllen in a swing seat carried by President Donald Trump last year. Gonzalez won the district, situated on the Gulf Coast and stretching from Brownsville toward Corpus Christi, by nearly 3 percentage points — the closest margin of Texas' 38 congressional districts last November. It is one of just 13 House districts nationwide that elected a Democrat while being carried by Trump, making Gonzalez a top target for Republicans as they look to maintain their slim House majority in 2026. The prospect of Flores' candidacy has excited Republicans in Texas and Washington, due in part to his military and law enforcement credentials. Flores is a Rio Grande Valley native and Spanish speaker in a district that is more than 90% Hispanic. He has held numerous public positions in South Texas, serving as a city attorney and municipal judge in Alton before a stint as assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of Texas' criminal division in McAllen from 2021 to the beginning of this year. There, he prosecuted transnational human smuggling along the border — an issue he hopes to raise in the election. 'I was prosecuting at a time when there were thousands and thousands of undocumented aliens coming into the U.S.,' Flores said in an interview. 'They're here unlawfully, and [we were] just, quite frankly, letting them in. It's policies like that that I want to go to D.C. and change.' But Flores is not as hardline as some members of his party. He said he wants to push for immigration policy that makes sense for a region that has struggled with labor shortages, especially as the Trump administration's immigration raids targeting undocumented workers have ramped up. 'Something that I'm going to be championing in D.C. is to ensure — especially [for] our farmers, for our boat manufacturers, for our steel mills that we have down here — that they have the workers that they need, having an efficient legal process for that,' he said. Though the district has shifted rightward in recent elections, Republicans have been unable to replicate their success down the ballot. Democratic Senate nominee Colin Allred won the district by 6 percentage points in 2024, and Gonzalez, a moderate who has represented South Texas since 2017, has proven difficult to beat. He defeated Republican Mayra Flores in 2022 and in 2024 by single-digit margins. Mayra Flores, who is not related to Eric Flores, has since announced a 2026 run in the nearby district of Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo. The boundaries of the 34th Congressional District, and others in the Rio Grande Valley, could be changed as Texas Republicans move to redraw the state's political lines in a special session that began Monday. South Texas — where Republicans have rapidly improved their margins with Hispanic voters — is a key area the GOP is targeting to flip seats, and the 34th District could be redrawn to include more Republican voters and become a friendlier seat for whoever captures the GOP nomination. In a statement to The Texas Tribune, Gonzalez suggested that his old opponent could still end up running in his district — and pledged to beat either candidate. 'If Mayra comes back, she will be mopping the floor with him and every other Republican primary candidate,' Gonzalez said. 'So [Eric] needs to get in line before he gets to the general election. If our district doesn't move too much, we'll kick his or anyone else's ass, just as we have the 19 candidates before.' But if Republicans push the 34th District into Republican areas near Corpus Christi, Gonzalez could end up running in a district tilted more in favor of the GOP — a prospect he acknowledged. 'The only way Republicans can beat me is by cheating and changing the district maps,' he lives in the neighboring 15th Congressional District, currently represented by Republican Rep. Monica De La Cruz of Edinburg. Members of Congress do not need to live in the district they represent, though doing so opens them up to criticism from opponents. This article originally appeared in The Texas Tribune at This article originally appeared on Corpus Christi Caller Times: GOP veteran to challenge Democrat Vicente Gonzalez for Congress
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
GOP Army veteran announces challenge to Democrat Vicente Gonzalez in South Texas congressional district
Eric Flores, a Republican Army veteran and lawyer from Mission, announced Monday he is running for Texas' 34th Congressional District, targeting Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez of McAllen in a swing seat carried by President Donald Trump last year. Gonzalez won the district, situated on the Gulf Coast and stretching from Brownsville toward Corpus Christi, by nearly 3 percentage points — the closest margin of Texas' 38 congressional districts last November. It is one of just 13 House districts nationwide that elected a Democrat while being carried by Trump, making Gonzalez a top target for Republicans as they look to maintain their slim House majority in 2026. The prospect of Flores' candidacy has excited Republicans in Texas and Washington, due in part to his military and law enforcement credentials. Flores is a Rio Grande Valley native and Spanish speaker in a district that is over 90% Hispanic. He has held numerous public positions in South Texas, serving as a city attorney and municipal judge in Alton before a stint as assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of Texas' criminal division in McAllen from 2021 to the beginning of this year. There, he prosecuted transnational human smuggling along the border — an issue he hopes to raise in the election. 'I was prosecuting at a time when there were thousands and thousands of undocumented aliens coming into the U.S.,' Flores said in an interview. 'They're here unlawfully, and [we were] just, quite frankly, letting them in. It's policies like that that I want to go to D.C. and change.' But Flores is not as hardline as some members of his party. He said he wants to push for immigration policy that makes sense for a region that has struggled with labor shortages, especially as the Trump administration's immigration raids targeting undocumented workers have ramped up. 'Something that I'm going to be championing in D.C. is to ensure — especially [for] our farmers, for our boat manufacturers, for our steel mills that we have down here — that they have the workers that they need, having an efficient legal process for that,' he said. Though the district has shifted rightward in recent elections, Republicans have been unable to replicate their success down the ballot. Democratic Senate nominee Colin Allred won the district by 6 percentage points in 2024, and Gonzalez, a moderate who has represented South Texas since 2017, has proven difficult to beat. He defeated Republican Mayra Flores in 2022 and in 2024 by single-digit margins. Mayra Flores, who is not related to Eric, has since announced a 2026 run in the nearby district of Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo. The boundaries of the 34th Congressional District, and others in the Rio Grande Valley, could be changed as Texas Republicans move to redraw the state's political lines in a special session that began Monday. South Texas — where Republicans have rapidly improved their margins with Hispanic voters — is a key area the GOP is targeting to flip seats, and the 34th District could be redrawn to include more Republican voters and become a friendlier seat for whoever captures the GOP nomination. In a statement to The Texas Tribune, Gonzalez suggested that his old opponent could still end up running in his district — and pledged to beat either candidate. 'If Mayra comes back, she will be mopping the floor with him and every other Republican primary candidate,' Gonzalez said. 'So [Eric] needs to get in line before he gets to the general election. If our district doesn't move too much, we'll kick his or anyone else's ass, just as we have the 19 candidates before.' But if Republicans push the 34th District into Republican areas near Corpus Christi, Gonzalez could end up running in a district tilted more in favor of the GOP — a prospect he acknowledged. 'The only way Republicans can beat me is by cheating and changing the district maps,' he said. Flores lives in the neighboring 15th Congressional District, currently represented by Republican Rep. Monica De La Cruz of Edinburg. Members of Congress do not need to live in the district they represent, though doing so opens them up to criticism from opponents. The lineup for The Texas Tribune Festival continues to grow! Be there when all-star leaders, innovators and newsmakers take the stage in downtown Austin, Nov. 13–15. The newest additions include comedian, actor and writer John Mulaney; Dallas mayor Eric Johnson; U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minnesota; New York Media Editor-at-Large Kara Swisher; and U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-El Paso. Get your tickets today! TribFest 2025 is presented by JPMorganChase.
Associated Press
3 days ago
- Health
- Associated Press
PHOTO ESSAY: A Texas town's residents stay inside -- even when they need medical care
WESLACO, Texas (AP) — As President Donald Trump intensifies deportation activity around the country, some immigrants — including many who have lived in Texas's southern tip for decades — are unwilling to leave their homes, even for necessary medical care. People here are among the most medically needy in the country. Nearly half the population is obese. Women are more likely to be diagnosed with cervical cancer and elderly people are more likely to develop dementia. Bladder cancers can be more aggressive. One out of every four people live with diabetes. As much as a third of the population here doesn't have health insurance to cover those ailments. And a quarter of people live in poverty, more than double the national average. Now, many in this region are on a path to develop worse health outcomes as they skip doctors appointments out of fear, said Dr. Stanley Fisch, a pediatrician who helped open Driscoll Children's Hospital in the region last year. White House officials have directed federal agents to leave no location, including hospitals and churches, unchecked in their drive to remove 1 million immigrants by year's end. Those agents are even combing through one of the federal government's largest medical record databases to search for immigrants who may be in the United States illegally. Federal agents' raids began reaching deeper into everyday life across the Rio Grande Valley in June, just as the area's 1.4 million residents began their summer ritual of enduring the suffocating heat. This working-class stretch of Texas solidly backed Trump in the 2024 election, despite campaign promises to ruthlessly pursue mass deportations. People here, who once moved regularly from the U.S. to Mexico to visit relatives or get cheap dental care, say they didn't realize his deportation campaign would focus on their neighbors. This is a documentary photo story curated by AP photo editors. Text from the APNews story, As Trump's raids ramp up, a Texas region's residents stay inside — even when they need medical care, by Amanda Seitz and Jacquelyn Martin.
Al Arabiya
3 days ago
- Health
- Al Arabiya
As Trump's raids ramp up, a Texas region's residents stay inside — even when they need medical care
These days Juanita says a prayer every time she steps off the driveway of her modest rural home. The 41-year-old mother who crossed into the United States from Mexico more than two decades ago and married an American carpenter fears federal agents may be on the hunt for her. As she was about to leave for the pharmacy late last month her husband called with a frantic warning: 'Immigration enforcement officers were swarming the store's parking lot.' Juanita who is prediabetic skipped filling medications that treat her nutrient deficiencies. She also couldn't risk being detained because she has to care for her 17-year-old daughter who has Down syndrome. 'If I am caught who's going to help my daughter?' Juanita asks in Spanish through an interpreter. Some people quoted in this story insisted that The Associated Press publish only their first names because of concerns over their immigration status. As the Trump administration intensifies deportation activity around the country some immigrants – including many who have lived in Texas's southern tip for decades – are unwilling to leave their homes even for necessary medical care. Tucked behind the freeway strip malls roadside taquerias and vast citrus groves that span this 160-mile stretch of the Rio Grande Valley are people like Juanita who need critical medical care in one of the nation's poorest and unhealthiest regions. For generations Mexican families have harmoniously settled – some legally some not – in this predominately Latino community where immigration status was once hardly top of mind. A very dangerous situation White House officials have directed federal agents to leave no location unchecked including hospitals and churches in their drive to remove 1 million immigrants by year's end. Those agents are even combing through the federal government's largest medical record databases to search for immigrants who may be in the United States illegally. Deportations and tougher restrictions will come with consequences says Mark Krikorian the director of the Center for Immigration Studies a think tank that favors restrictive immigration policies. 'We shouldn't have let it get out of hand the way we did,' Krikorian says of the previous administration's immigration policies. 'Some businesses are going to have difficulties. Some communities are going to face difficulties.' Federal agents raids began reaching deeper into everyday life across the Rio Grande Valley in June just as the area's 1.4 million residents began their summer ritual of enduring the suffocating heat. This working-class stretch of Texas solidly backed Trump in the 2024 election despite campaign promises to ruthlessly pursue mass deportations. People here who once moved regularly from the US to Mexico to visit relatives or get cheap dental care say they didn't realize his deportation campaign would focus on their neighbors. But in recent weeks restaurant workers have been escorted out mid-shift and farmers have suddenly lost field workers. Schoolchildren talk openly about friends who lost a parent in raids. More than a dozen were arrested last month at local flea markets according to local news reports and Border Patrol officials. 'Immigrants are staying shut inside their mobiles homes and shacks that make up the colonias zoning-free neighborhoods that sometimes don't have access to running water or electricity,' says Sandra de la Cruz-Yarrison who runs the Holy Family Services Inc. clinic in Weslaco Texas. 'People are not going to risk it,' de la Cruz-Yarrison says. 'People are being stripped from their families.' Yet people here are among the most medically needy in the country. Nearly half the population is obese. Women are more likely to be diagnosed with cervical cancer and elderly people are more likely to develop dementia. Bladder cancers can be more aggressive. One out of every four people lives with diabetes. As much as a third of the population doesn't have health insurance to cover those ailments. And a quarter of people live in poverty more than double the national average. Now many in this region are on a path to develop worse health outcomes as they skip doctors appointments out of fear says Dr. Stanley Fisch a pediatrician who helped open Driscoll Children's Hospital in the region last year. 'We've always had unfortunately people who have gone with untreated diabetes for a long time and now it's compounded with these other issues at the moment,' Fisch says. 'This is a very dangerous situation for people. The population is suffering accordingly.' Trepidations about going to clinics are spreading Elvia was the unlucky – and unsuspecting – patient who sat down for the finger prick the clinic offers everyone during its monthly educational meeting for community members. As blood oozed out of her finger the monitor registered a 194 glucose level indicating she is prediabetic. She balked at the idea of writing down her address for regular care at Holy Family Services clinic. Nor did she want to enroll in Medicaid the federal and state funded program that provides health care coverage to the poorest Americans. Although she is a legal resident some people living in her house do not have legal status. Fewer people have come to Holy Family Services clinic with coverage in recent months says billing coordinator Elizabeth Reta. Over decades the clinic's midwifery staff has helped birth thousands of babies in bathtubs or on cozy beds in birthing houses situated throughout the campus. But now Reta says some parents are too scared to sign those children up for health insurance because they do not want to share too much information with the government. 'Even people I personally know that used to have Medicaid for their children that were born here – that are legally here but the parents are not – they stopped requesting Medicaid,' Reta says. Their worry is well-founded. An Associated Press investigation last week revealed that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have gained access to personal health data – including addresses – of the nation's 79 million Medicaid and Children's Health Insurance Program enrollees. The disclosure will allow ICE officials to receive identity and location information of aliens documents obtained by the AP say. In Texas the governor started requiring emergency room staff to ask patients about their legal status a move that doctors have argued will dissuade immigrants from seeking needed care. State officials have said the data will show how much money is spent on care for immigrants who may not be here legally. Federal law requires emergency rooms to treat any patients who come to the doors. Visits to Holy Family Services mobile clinic have stopped altogether since Trump took office. The van which once offered checkups at the doorsteps in the colonias now sits running on idle. Its constant hum is heard throughout the clinic's campus to keep medical supplies fresh in the 100-degree temperatures. 'These were hard-hit communities that really needed the services,' de la Cruz-Yarrison says. 'People were just not coming after the administration changed.' A mother almost loses a son. A daughter is too scared to visit the doctor Immigrants were less likely to seek medical care during Trump's first term multiple studies concluded. A 2023 study of well-child visits in Boston Minneapolis and Little Rock Arkansas noted a 5 percent drop for children who were born to immigrant mothers after Trump was elected in 2016. The study also noted declines in visits when news about Trump's plans to tighten immigration rules broke throughout his first term. 'It's a really high-anxiety environment where they're afraid to talk to the pediatrician go to school or bring their kids to child care,' says Stephanie Ettinger de Cuba a Boston University researcher who oversaw the study. A delayed trip to the doctor almost cost 82-year-old Maria Isabel de Perez her son this spring. He refused to seek help for his intense and constant stomach pains for weeks instead popping Tylenol daily so he could still labor in the farm fields of Arkansas she says. He put off going to the hospital as rumors swirled that immigration enforcement officials were outside of the hospital. 'He waited and waited because he felt the pain but was too scared to go to the hospital,' she explains in Spanish through an interpreter. 'He couldn't go until the appendix exploded.' Her son is still recovering after surgery and has not been able to return to work she says. Perez is a permanent resident who has lived in the United States for 40 years. But all of her children were born in Mexico and because she is a green card holder she cannot sponsor them for citizenship. Maria meanwhile only leaves her house to volunteer at Holy Family Services food bank. She's skipped work on nearby farms. And after last month's arrests she won't sell clothes for money at the flea market anymore. So she stuffs cardboard boxes with loaves of bread potatoes peppers and beans that will be handed out to the hungry. Before the raids began about 130 people would drive up to collect a box of food from Maria. But on this sweltering June day only 68 people show up for food. She brings home a box every week to her children ages 16 11 and 4 who are spending the summer shut inside. Her 16-year-old daughter has skipped the checkup she needs to refill her depression medication. The teenager who checks in on friends whose parents have been arrested in immigration raids through a text group chat insists she is doing OK. Maria left Mexico years ago because dangerous gangs rule her hometown she explains. She's married now to an American truck driver. 'We're not bad people,' Maria says from her dining room table where her 4-year-old son happily eats a lime green popsicle. 'We just want to have a better future for our children.' Juanita the prediabetic mother who hasn't filled her prescriptions out of fear was not sure when she would brave the pharmacy again. But with a cross hanging around her neck the devout Catholic says she will say three invocations before she does. Explains her 15-year-old son Jose: 'We always pray before we leave.'
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
As Trump's raids ramp up, a Texas region's residents stay inside — even when they need medical care
WESLACO, Texas (AP) — These days, Juanita says a prayer every time she steps off the driveway of her modest rural home. The 41-year-old mother, who crossed into the United States from Mexico more than two decades ago and married an American carpenter, fears federal agents may be on the hunt for her. As she was about to leave for the pharmacy late last month, her husband called with a frantic warning: Immigration enforcement officers were swarming the store's parking lot. Juanita, who is prediabetic, skipped filling medications that treat her nutrient deficiencies. She also couldn't risk being detained because she has to care for her 17-year-old daughter, who has Down syndrome. 'If I am caught, who's going to help my daughter?" Juanita asks in Spanish, through an interpreter. Some people quoted in this story insisted that The Associated Press publish only their first names because of concerns over their immigration status. As the Trump administration intensifies deportation activity around the country, some immigrants — including many who have lived in Texas's southern tip for decades — are unwilling to leave their homes, even for necessary medical care. Tucked behind the freeway strip malls, roadside taquerias and vast citrus groves that span this 160-mile stretch of the Rio Grande Valley are people like Juanita, who need critical medical care in one of the nation's poorest and unhealthiest regions. For generations, Mexican families have harmoniously settled — some legally, some not — in this predominately Latino community where immigration status was once hardly top of mind. A 'very dangerous situation' White House officials have directed federal agents to leave no location unchecked, including hospitals and churches, in their drive to remove 1 million immigrants by year's end. Those agents are even combing through the federal government's largest medical record databases to search for immigrants who may be in the United States illegally. Deportations and tougher restrictions will come with consequences, says Mark Krikorian, the director of the Center for Immigration Studies, a think tank that favors restrictive immigration policies. 'We shouldn't have let it get out of hand the way we did,' Krikorian says of the previous administration's immigration policies. 'Some businesses are going to have difficulties. Some communities are going to face difficulties." Federal agents' raids began reaching deeper into everyday life across the Rio Grande Valley in June, just as the area's 1.4 million residents began their summer ritual of enduring the suffocating heat. This working-class stretch of Texas solidly backed Trump in the 2024 election, despite campaign promises to ruthlessly pursue mass deportations. People here, who once moved regularly from the U.S. to Mexico to visit relatives or get cheap dental care, say they didn't realize his deportation campaign would focus on their neighbors. But in recent weeks, restaurant workers have been escorted out mid-shift and farmers have suddenly lost field workers. Schoolchildren talk openly about friends who lost a parent in raids. More than a dozen were arrested last month at local flea markets, according to local news reports and Border Patrol officials. Immigrants are staying shut inside their mobiles homes and shacks that make up the 'colonias," zoning-free neighborhoods that sometimes don't have access to running water or electricity, says Sandra de la Cruz-Yarrison, who runs the Holy Family Services, Inc. clinic in Weslaco, Texas. 'People are not going to risk it,' de la Cruz-Yarrison says. 'People are being stripped from their families.' Yet people here are among the most medically needy in the country. Nearly half the population is obese. Women are more likely to be diagnosed with cervical cancer and elderly people are more likely to develop dementia. Bladder cancers can be more aggressive. One out of every four people lives with diabetes. As much as a third of the population doesn't have health insurance to cover those ailments. And a quarter of people live in poverty, more than double the national average. Now, many in this region are on a path to develop worse health outcomes as they skip doctors appointments out of fear, says Dr. Stanley Fisch, a pediatrician who helped open Driscoll Children's Hospital in the region last year. 'We've always had, unfortunately, people who have gone with untreated diabetes for a long time and now it's compounded with these other issues at the moment,' Fisch says. 'This is a very dangerous situation for people. The population is suffering accordingly.' Trepidations about going to clinics are spreading Elvia was the unlucky — and unsuspecting — patient who sat down for the finger prick the clinic offers everyone during its monthly educational meeting for community members. As blood oozed out of her finger, the monitor registered a 194 glucose level, indicating she is prediabetic. She balked at the idea of writing down her address for regular care at Holy Family Services' clinic. Nor did she want to enroll in Medicaid, the federal and state funded program that provides health care coverage to the poorest Americans. Although she is a legal resident, some people living in her house do not have legal status. Fewer people have come to Holy Family Services' clinic with coverage in recent months, says billing coordinator Elizabeth Reta. Over decades, the clinic's midwifery staff has helped birth thousands of babies in bathtubs or on cozy beds in birthing houses situated throughout the campus. But now, Reta says, some parents are too scared to sign those children up for health insurance because they do not want to share too much information with the government. 'Even people I personally know that used to have Medicaid for their children that were born here — that are legally here, but the parents are not — they stopped requesting Medicaid," Reta says. Their worry is well-founded. An Associated Press investigation last week revealed that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have gained access to personal health data — including addresses — of the nation's 79 million Medicaid and Children's Health Insurance Program enrollees. The disclosure will allow ICE officials to receive 'identity and location information of aliens,' documents obtained by the AP say. In Texas, the governor started requiring emergency room staff to ask patients about their legal status, a move that doctors have argued will dissuade immigrants from seeking needed care. State officials have said the data will show how much money is spent on care for immigrants who may not be here legally. Federal law requires emergency rooms to treat any patients who come to the doors. Visits to Holy Family Services' mobile clinic have stopped altogether since Trump took office. The van, which once offered checkups at the doorsteps in the colonias, now sits running on idle. Its constant hum is heard throughout the clinic's campus, to keep medical supplies fresh in the 100-degree temperatures. 'These were hard-hit communities that really needed the services,' de la Cruz-Yarrison says. 'People were just not coming after the administration changed.' A mother almost loses a son. A daughter is too scared to visit the doctor Immigrants were less likely to seek medical care during Trump's first term, multiple studies concluded. A 2023 study of well-child visits in Boston, Minneapolis and Little Rock, Arkansas, noted a 5% drop for children who were born to immigrant mothers after Trump was elected in 2016. The study also noted declines in visits when news about Trump's plans to tighten immigration rules broke throughout his first term. 'It's a really high-anxiety environment where they're afraid to talk to the pediatrician, go to school or bring their kids to child care,' says Stephanie Ettinger de Cuba, a Boston University researcher who oversaw the study. A delayed trip to the doctor almost cost 82-year-old Maria Isabel de Perez her son this spring. He refused to seek help for his intense and constant stomach pains for weeks, instead popping Tylenol daily so he could still labor in the farm fields of Arkansas, she says. He put off going to the hospital as rumors swirled that immigration enforcement officials were outside of the hospital. 'He waited and waited because he felt the pain but was too scared to go to the hospital,' she explains in Spanish through an interpreter. 'He couldn't go until the appendix exploded.' Her son is still recovering after surgery and has not been able to return to work, she says. Perez is a permanent resident who has lived in the United States for 40 years. But all of her children were born in Mexico, and, because she is a green card holder, she cannot sponsor them for citizenship. Maria, meanwhile, only leaves her house to volunteer at Holy Family Services' food bank. She's skipped work on nearby farms. And after last month's arrests, she won't sell clothes for money at the flea market anymore. So she stuffs cardboard boxes with loaves of bread, potatoes, peppers and beans that will be handed out to the hungry. Before the raids began, about 130 people would drive up to collect a box of food from Maria. But on this sweltering June day, only 68 people show up for food. She brings home a box every week to her children, ages 16, 11 and 4, who are spending the summer shut inside. Her 16-year-old daughter has skipped the checkup she needs to refill her depression medication. The teenager, who checks in on friends whose parents have been arrested in immigration raids through a text group chat, insists she is 'doing OK.' Maria left Mexico years ago because dangerous gangs rule her hometown, she explains. She's married now to an American truck driver. 'We're not bad people,' Maria says from her dining room table, where her 4-year-old son happily eats a lime green popsicle. 'We just want to have a better future for our children.' Juanita, the prediabetic mother who hasn't filled her prescriptions out of fear, was not sure when she would brave the pharmacy again. But with a cross hanging around her neck, the devout Catholic says she will say three invocations before she does. Explains her 15-year-old son, Jose: 'We always pray before we leave." ___ The Associated Press receives support from the National Press Club Journalism Institute's Public Health Reporting Fellowship, funded by the Common Health Coalition. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Solve the daily Crossword
