understands

Rep. Robert Garcia’s relatives, many of Peruvian decent, have been asking him recently if they need to carry identification with them, as federal agents seemingly round up brown people at will.

His answer? Yes, but don’t let fear quell resistance.

“What’s happening right now with the terror of seeing masked men with rifles running into communities and scooping people up, the images that people are seeing on the TV of folks being sent to foreign prisons that have committed no crime, this is a serious moment,” he told me last week, ducking off the House floor where President Trump’s mess of a bill was being debated to speak by phone.

But “we cannot just allow all this to happen and for there to be no accountability for these actions,” Garcia added.

These days, Garcia is all about accountability. The Long Beach representative was recently was chosen by his Democratic congressional peers — after less than three years in office — for the minority party’s top job on the powerful House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

For those of you who aren’t government wonks, that’s a prime position for pushing back against Trump. So, as the president would say, it’s A BIG DEAL! Especially for a young guy — because usually the role goes to an old politician with seniority.

That’s left some, myself included, wondering if Garcia, 47, isn’t our insider Zohran Mamdani — the young, charismatic New Yorker whose recent win in the mayoral primary has left Democrats reeling with the reality that voters want fighters, and that patriotism isn’t just what MAGA decides it is.

Garcia has the same kind of energy and confidence that his version of America — one that is unabashedly inclusive, affordable and fair — is what his constituents want, and one he’s expected to fight for.

“I love this country,” Garcia said. “I feel like Trump and his minions don’t understand what real patriotism is.”

If you missed the fantastic profile of Garcia that my colleagues Seema Mehta and Andrea Castillo did not long ago, I’ll give you the highlights. Garcia came to this country from Peru when he was 5, his parents like so many seeking safety and opportunity.

The family overstayed their visas and joined the millions of undocumented Californians working hard, hoping harder and dreaming of a day when America embraced them the way they embraced America.

His mom cleaned houses and worked in a thrift store. Garcia taught himself English reading Superman comics. He excelled in school and by the time he was in college, Ronald Reagan of all people offered him a path to citizenship with the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act. He grabbed it.

“When I swore an oath to the Constitution, that actually meant something to me,” he said. “I had to fight for citizenship.”

Garcia went into public service and was elected mayor of Long Beach, the city’s youngest, first openly gay and first Latino mayor. Then he jumped to Congress in 2022, becoming president of his freshman Democratic class.

He is the American dream. But also the American nightmare to some on the far right, who may never forgive him for once being undocumented and doing the worst thing an undocumented person can do — succeed.

“I am who I am,” he said. “I’m a U.S. citizen. I have just as much right to be here and to serve as he does, and I’m not scared of Donald Trump.”

Garcia’s rapid rise in Congress shows he’s not just a brawler, but one with finesse. Garcia beat out Massachusetts Rep. Stephen Lynch, 70, for the job on the Oversight Committee. And before that, Maryland Rep. Kweisi Mfume, 76, bowed out, lacking support. He also bested Texas Rep. Jasmine Crockett, 44, who has made a name for herself as a clever pugilist.

“It was clear by the numbers that my style of leadership is not exactly what [Democrats] were looking for, and so I didn’t think that it was fair for me to push forward and try to rebuke that,” Crockett told Politico after dropping her bid.

Garcia was able to combine his willingness to spar with the boring necessity of being a good manager, something he learned from running Long Beach. The committee role Garcia has now opened up when Virginia Rep. Gerry Connolly died of cancer in May.

New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, long considered the youthful firebrand of the Democratic Party, sought the job earlier this year but was rebuffed in favor of Connolly, with his years of clout. But that was before Mamdani, and the internal blowup within the party over age and attitude.

Ocasio-Cortez decided not to pursue the role a second time, but Garcia said she was one of the first people he spoke with when he decided to try his own luck.

“It’s been clear to me that the party should welcome generational change,” he said, echoing a now-familiar line. “There’s a groundswell out there of folks that want new ideas, that want us to be aggressive against Trump.”

With Democrats in the minority in both houses of Congress, there isn’t too much Garcia or any Democrat can do to stop the Trump agenda. But it’s important to make noise, set markers for future action and speak truth, Garcia said — and lay the groundwork for a time when Democrats do have a majority.

“The first thing is, we’ve got to be serious about having an anti-corruption agenda that includes taking a look at all of the horrific ways that [Trump’s] enriching himself and his family,” Garcia said.

The fancy dinner for investors of his cryptocurrency, the Qatari jet, his new perfume. The examples of Trump profiting off the presidency are numerous.

Garcia calls it “enormous grift” and “huge steps backward for our democracy.”

And then there is fellow Californian Stephen Miller, the architect of Trump’s immigration offensive.

If Democrats are ever back in power, and Oversight Committee Democrats can issue subpoenas and conduct investigations, “rest assured that Stephen Miller needs to be answering questions,” Garcia said. “Elon Musk needs to be asked questions in front of the Oversight Committee. So that agenda is going to be critical.”

But also, it’s not all about Trump.

“We have to also have a forward-looking agenda of, how do we make government work better?” he said. “It’s a bigger question about what kind of country, not only that we want to live in right now, but what kind of country we can actually build in the future.”