2020: Biden Refers to Julian Castro as ‘Julio’

Former Vice President Joe Biden on Friday referred to 2020 competitor Julian Castro as “Julio” while addressing the National Education Association’s presidential forum in Texas.

Biden appeared on stage right after Castro, the former San Antonio Mayor who was also President Barack Obama’s Housing and Urban Development (HUD) secretary. Castro was sworn in by Biden.

Castro discussed his comprehensive education plan that includes investments in “wraparound services” after empathizing with teachers who “see the impact that” the healthcare system “and its shortcomings have on children each and every day.”

“My education plan calls for investing in a community-school-based model that includes wraparound services so that students are able to avail themselves of good resources so they can be healthier,” Castro said. “I believe that all of these things go together. All of these dots are connected. We don’t exist, we don’t live in silos and neither should our policy in this country.”

Biden spoke about why educators need to craft education policy, and he promised the audience that the secretary of education in his administration will be a teacher who is not his wife before adding: “You gotta have, as Julio said, wraparound initiatives here.”

“We have to bering the entire community in. Everything from the Boys and Girls Club to the YMCAs to the community development programs,” Biden continued.

Biden said children need to be exposed to “what they have the potential to do” and also pushed for school districts to receive funding to bring in professionals like psychologists who can aid teachers because school districts “ask too much” of teachers now, especially in economically deprived areas and “tough” neighborhoods.

In a gaffe that could make more Democrats wonder if Biden is like the hurler who does not have his best heater anymore, Biden made his remarks just hours after his CNN interview aired in which he referred to Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA), a female Democrat of color, as “the person who came at me” during last week’s presidential debate.