He set out to mobilize Latino voters. Then the virus hit.
GRAHAM, N.C. (AP) - Like many Americans, Ricky Hurtado had plans for his summer.
He formally launched his first bid for public office in March and expected to spend sweltering days knocking on doors, clenching glossy campaign literature and making his case directly to voters. This summer, he was going prove that a 31-year-old son of Salvadoran immigrants could give Latinos a say - even in North Carolina, even in part of Donald Trump´s America.
But this is a story about waiting - and about the detours on the path to power.
The coronavirus upended the Democrat´s campaign for statehouse. Hurtado stopped door-knocking. The closest he came to potential voters was standing 6 feet or more away while volunteering at food banks or a virus testing site. And, still, he contracted the virus himself.
Across the U.S., the coronavirus outbreak is disrupting Latinos´ difficult climb up the political ladder. The disease has disproportionately sickened Latinos and impeded voter registration ahead of the November presidential election. In North Carolina, only 5,000 Latinos have been added to the voter rolls since mid-March, less than half the number added during the same period four years ago.
The state has 1 million Latino residents, but two-thirds are not eligible to vote because they are either under age 18 or not citizens - the second-highest rate in the nation.
Ricky Hurtado, a Democratic candidate for the North Carolina state house, right, talks to volunteers before they head out to canvass voters, in Mebane, N.C., Sunday, March 8, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
In Alamance County amid the housing tracts and thick forests reaching between Raleigh and Greensboro, there are three Latinos who cannot vote for every one who can.
For decades, those numbers meant that Latinos´ growing population in the state didn´t translate into political power.
Now the children of immigrants are coming of age.
"It really all depends on me," said John Paul Garcia, 20, the only member of his family of six who can vote. "I´m my sister´s voice, my brother´s voice, my parents´ voice."
Trump won North Carolina by less than 4 percentage points. Hurtado´s Democrat predecessor lost the statehouse seat by 298 votes in 2018.
Hurtado knows it would easier to focus on white voters, still the majority in the district. But he wants his campaign to be about more than just winning the seat, flipping the legislature or even putting a Democrat in the White House.
"It´s actually engaging people," he said this spring, as he drove to knock on doors in one of the many trailer parks across the county.
It would be the last time Hurtado door-knocked before the pandemic hit.
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Hurtado´s parents arrived in the United States in the trunk of a car.
The two fled the civil war in El Salvador in 1980 and were driven across the Mexican border into California. Hurtado was born in Los Angeles, but when he was 7 his family moved to North Carolina, hoping the cleaner air would be better for his asthma.
Hurtado was conscious he was viewed as different.
"No somos de aquí, ni de alla," is how he describes his feeling of alienation, using a phrase that translates to: "We're from neither here nor there."
Hurtado earned a degree from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, and followed that up with a master´s in public policy from Princeton University. He was drawn back south when his adopted state´s governor at the time, Republican Pat McCrory, urged the federal government to deport thousands of unaccompanied children who were then crossing the border to flee violence in Central America.
"I just felt like, `That´s not the North Carolina I know,´´´ Hurtado said.
Hurtado plunged into the local activist scene, where he met Yazmin Garcia. After they married, Hurtado and Garcia settled in Alamance County. Hurtado now has a different way of describing his roots: "Soy de aquí y de alla."
"I´m from both here and there."
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Finding Latino voters was always going to be difficult. Fear of immigration authorities is ever-present. That´s partly due to Alamance County Sheriff Terry Johnson, a Republican first elected in 2002, when he ran TV ads that warned of "aliens" in the county and played music from the old TV series "The Twilight Zone."
Johnson was the only sheriff in the country other than Arizona´s Joe Arpaio to be sued by the Obama administration's Justice Department for civil rights violations against Latinos.
A federal judge dismissed the case. Johnson believes the government merely "wanted a Southern sheriff to make an example out of," he said in an interview.
Johnson remains a menacing figure to some Latinos, while others support him. Latinos here and across the U.S. are politically diverse.
Omar Lugo, 42, blames liberal activists rather than Johnson for local Latinos´ fears. "By accusing the sheriff of being racist, that doesn´t take us anywhere," Lugo said.
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When Aranza Sosa, 22, went to the Graham town square holding Black Lives Matter signs in early June, Johnson´s deputies turned her away. They've watched over the square and a monument to the county´s fallen Confederate soldiers in the weeks since national protests broke out over racial justice and policing.
Sosa was upset by their presence. She learned of Hurtado´s campaign and called him in tears.
There have been a lot of tears for Sosa lately. Her uncle died of COVID-19 in late May. Some days she´s so anxious about catching the disease that she can´t go to work at her job in a retirement home. On most days, Sosa goes in. She needs the money.
"My job, I´m lucky to have it, but under the circumstances it breaks a lot of people," Sosa said. "It feels like I´m expendable, at this point, to the government."
The Pew Hispanic Center found that 59% of Latinos say they or someone in their household has lost a job or wages due to the virus, well above the 43% of U.S. adults reporting the same.
In Alamance County, where Latinos are 13% of the population, they account for 62% of the county´s 2,500 COVID cases.
Hurtado and his wife both know how disruptive the illness can be. In mid-June they came down with the virus. Their bout was relatively mild, and they recovered by early July.
But there´s another disappointment weighing down the household.
Garcia was nearing the end of the yearslong slog to become a U.S. citizen. One of her final steps, an in-person interview, was postponed in March due to the pandemic.
Immigration services hasn´t rescheduled the appointment, making Garcia one of an estimated 315,000 people unlikely to get their citizenship processed before the election.
Garcia may not be able to vote for her husband.
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Associated Press writer Angeliki Kastanis in Los Angeles contributed to this report.
Dulce, 6, and her brother play in the yard of their family home across the railroad tracks in Burlington, N.C., Monday, March 9, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
John Paul Garcia, 20, right, waits for his turn at the barber shop, Blast Barber Studio/Barberia, in Burlington, N.C., Thursday, March 12, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Marta Lagunes Hernandez, 49, who is originally from Mexico and whose son is a registered voter, talks with Ricky Hurtado, a Democratic candidate for the North Carolina state house, as he canvasses in a largely Latino trailer community, in Burlington, N.C., Sunday, March 8, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
John Paul Garcia, 20, center, plays basketball with friends from the community college that they attend, Allan Berduo, 19, left, Duncan Syhachack, 19, and Cesar Hernandez, 19, far right, in Elon, N.C., Monday, March 9, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Alexa Montoya, 5, left, and Kimberly Rivera, 3, play with dolls as Kimberly's mother registers to vote during a voter registration in a largely Latino trailer community in Burlington, N.C., Wednesday, March 11, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Ricky Hurtado, a Democratic candidate for the North Carolina state house, walks past a child's toy car as he canvasses in a largely Latino trailer community, in Burlington, N.C., Sunday, March 8, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
A section of highway that has been adopted by the Sons of Confederate Veterans Camp 813 is seen in Alamance County, N.C., Wednesday, March 11, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Evelyn Lara, 19, with her brother Iker, 7, opens the door as Ricky Hurtado, a Democratic candidate for the North Carolina state house, canvasses voters in a largely Latino trailer community, in Burlington, N.C., Sunday, March 8, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Prisi Hernandez, left, and Laura Hernandez, both with the organization Siembra NC, help Nery Ocampo, 19, center, to register to vote, as Irvin Bahena, 10, stops to watch from his bicycle, in a largely Latino trailer community in Burlington, N.C., Wednesday, March 11, 2020. It will be Ocampo's first time voting. voting. "I didn't have time to register before," says Ocampo, "it's important for Latinos who can to vote, in order to help those who can't." (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Ricky Hurtado, a Democratic candidate for the North Carolina state house, strategizes inside his campaign headquarters, in Graham, N.C., Tuesday, March 10, 2020, in front of a map of Alamance County. He is the first Latino candidate to run for North Carolina's House of Representatives. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Esperanza Carrillo, of Burlington, N.C., washes cars at Vivas Hand Car Wash, Wednesday, March 11, 2020, along a strip of Latino owned businesses. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Vivas Hand Car Wash owner Telesforo Vivas, of Sanford N.C., who has been in business for 5 years, washes a car window, in Burlington, N.C., Wednesday, March 11, 2020. His car wash is along a businesses strip of Latino-owned businesses. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
A "Captain America" themed children's bicycle is seen during a voter registration drive at a largely Latino trailer community in Burlington, N.C., Wednesday, March 11, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Alamance County Sheriff Terry Johnson poses for a portrait in his office in Graham, N.C., Thursday, March 12, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Claudia Bahena, 21, of Burlington, N.C., right, is helped to register to vote during a voter registration drive by community activists, in Burlington, N.C., Wednesday, March 11, 2020. At left is Lizet Miranda, who offered her home as a site for neighbors who are eligible to register. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Sebastian Cervantes, 9, left, watches as Marvin Montoya, 10, makes a basket, next to Irvin Bahena, 10, in Burlington, N.C., Wednesday, March 11, 2020, at a largely Latino trailer community. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
John Paul Garcia, 20, hugs his mother at their home in Burlington, N.C., Thursday, March 12, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Dulce, 6, plays in the yard of their family home across the railroad tracks in Burlington, N.C., Monday, March 9, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
A Waffle House, Burger King, and Taco Bell are among the restaurants with lit signs seen along a road at night in Burlington, N.C., Monday, March 9, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
A monument to Confederate soldiers is seen in front of the Alamance County Courthouse in Graham, N.C., Monday, March 9, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Ricky Hurtado, a Democratic candidate for the North Carolina state house, poses for a portrait by a mural in Graham, N.C., Tuesday, March 10, 2020. He is the first Latino candidate to run for North Carolina's House of Representatives. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
