WASHINGTON — Texas lawmakers in Congress brought their own guests to the State of the Union as a way to drive home some key political issues.

Fresh off his victory in the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate, Rep. Colin Allred, D-Dallas, used the State of the Union speech to showcase the loss of abortion rights in Texas, a major election issue for Democrats this year.

“It doesn't have to be this way,” Allred told Spectrum News. “Now, we can restore this right, access to abortion, allowing women to make their own health care decisions. We can do that at the federal level by codifying Roe v. Wade.”

Allred invited Dr. Austin Dennard and said he was inspired by how she came forward with her story. Dennard is an obstetrician-gynecologist from Dallas who left the state for an abortion after her fetus was diagnosed with a fatal birth defect. 

“It was heartbreaking and terrifying all at once. I was looking at the ultrasound screen and realizing in real time that there was a catastrophic problem with my pregnancy, and that I was going to have to flee my own state,” she said. 

“The laws cause so much fear that it's really paralyzing the system. Women have nowhere to go, they have no one to talk to about where to go, and doctors are really put on the line if they help counsel a patient who needs abortion care,” Dennard continued.

Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Dallas, invited Carla Gates, the widow of a Dallas postal worker who died during the 2023 heat wave. Gates told Spectrum News she hopes there will be federal heat standards and wants to see more industries implement cooling stations for workers. 

“I've talked with a lot of the postal workers. They are afraid to go to work because they don't want to end up being the way my husband was. They do not want to put their family in a position that I was left in,” Gates said.

“No one at 119 degrees should be outside working. No one. And I would like to see that policy changed for better working conditions,” she continued. 

Crockett criticized the Republican-led state legislature for passing the so-called Death Star law that restricted cities from passing their own ordinances if they went beyond state rules. The law preempted some local ordinances that implemented protections for workers in the extreme heat.

“Number one, we don't want Mr. Gates to be forgotten. Number two, (Biden) is the most pro-union president that we had. This is someone that supports those that are out on the front lines, trying to make sure that they organize for better wages as well as better working conditions,” Crockett told Spectrum News. 

Another progressive Democrat, Rep. Greg Casar, D-Austin, emphasized labor rights. He brought Rick Levy, president of the Texas AFL-CIO. 

“There are these big corporations that are making record profits right now in Texas, but the only way that we can share in that prosperity is if we're at the negotiating table, and that's what Rick represents,” Casar said. 

“This president has used the word union and stood up for union workers,” Levy said. “He's the first president in the history of this country to walk a picket line like he did with the United Auto Workers. His policies put workers at the center, he's building the economy from the down up.” 

The State of the Union came exactly a week after Biden traveled to Brownsville, Texas. It was a day of dueling border visits, as former President Donald Trump was 300 miles away in Eagle Pass. The emergence of border and immigration as top election issues have ramped up the rhetoric. 

Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-San Antonio, invited Priscilla Martinez as his guest. 

“I'm bringing the widow of a man who was killed in North Texas because he was Hispanic. He was targeted by his neighbor because he was Hispanic,” Castro told Spectrum News. “There's a lot of anti-immigrant rhetoric and anti-immigrant sentiment right now, and so I thought it was important to highlight that.”

Border security is top of mind for Texas Republicans, like Sen. Ted Cruz, who will face off Allred in the fall.

Cruz invited Presidio County Sheriff Danny Dominguez to the State of the Union. In a statement Cruz called him “a selfless law enforcement official on the front lines of this unprecedented illegal immigration crisis.” 

“Sheriff Dominguez has seen first-hand the devastating impact of this crisis: children that have been brutalized, women that have been raped, and Americans dying from narcotics and fentanyl flooding through our open border. Enough is enough. Together, we share the common goal of securing our communities from danger and lawlessness that this open border represents,” Cruz continued. 

Another Texas Republican brought a border-related guest. Rep. Beth Van Duyne, R-Irving, invited Tom Homan, a former acting director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement during the Trump administration.

“It shows a complete dichotomy between this current president who has created this massive disaster at our borders and somebody who actually worked on policy to secure our borders, who actually worked with the former administration, who worked with President Trump to actually make sure that our numbers were lower,” Van Duyne told Spectrum News. 

During his State of the Union, Biden called on Congress to pass the border security deal hashed out between a bipartisan group of senators and the White House. But his message did little to change the minds of some Texas Republicans who have long been disappointed with his handling of the situation there. Biden called out GOP lawmakers for rejecting the agreement at Trump’s request. 

“Anybody with a brain who looks at the Senate bill knows it was a purposeful effort to give them an excuse for why they could blame Republicans when it is they who have left the borders wide open,” Rep. Chip Roy, R-Austin, said.  “I'm part of that group that says, if we do not have border security, we will have no funding." 

Rep. Monica De La Cruz, R-Edinburg, represents a Hispanic-majority district in South Texas and delivered the Spanish-language Republican rebuttal to the president’s speech. 

“What I wanted was for them to hear from me, as a Hispanic female living on the border, a single mom that understands what all Americans are feeling right now. And what they're feeling is that gas prices are too high. They go to the grocery store and they're afraid to get to the cashier,” De La Cruz told Spectrum News. 

First lady Jill Biden included some Texans on her guest list. One is Kate Cox of Dallas, who requested permission to obtain an abortion and sued the state after receiving a fatal fetal diagnosis. Cox was ultimately denied and fled the state to have the procedure. 

"The laws today added a lot more pain to what was already the most painful times of our lives. That's why I want to share our story, and that's why I hope it'll be different one day,” Cox said. 

The first lady also invited Jazmin Cazares of Uvalde.  Her sister Jackie was killed in the Robb Elementary shooting. She has since become an advocate for stricter gun control legislation.