WASHINGTON (AP) — When President Barack Obama flew to California to dedicate a national monument to Latino labor leader Cesar Chavez, a group of the activist's relatives were invited to pose for photos with the president.
Julie Chavez Rodriguez, Chavez's granddaughter, hung back. As a member of Obama's staff, she had traveled with the official party to the event, but she did not want to call attention to herself.
Only when Obama's senior adviser, Valerie Jarrett, insisted did Rodriguez reluctantly step forward, barely making it into the frame.
“I said, ‘Julie, you have to be up there with your family,’” said Jarrett, who was Rodriguez’s boss in the White House Office of Public Engagement. “And she said, ‘No, I’m staff today.’”
White House staffers are often of a type, hard-charging strivers who crave their own sliver of the limelight or even trade on a famous name. Rodriguez has been a clear exception. In her second tour serving a Democratic president, she's served as director of intergovernmental affairs for Joe Biden, and she was made a senior adviser last June. On Tuesday, Biden announced that Rodriguez will be chair his reelection campaign.
In her White House job over the past two years, Rodriguez and her staff helped state, local and tribal governments, and Puerto Rico and the other U.S. territories, with their federal government needs. That included combating COVID-19 and distributing aid from the $1.9 trillion in Biden's coronavirus relief plan.
Jarrett and others who have worked with Rodriguez describe a dedicated worker who, while shaped by a famous progenitor, doesn't put her family front and center.
Cecilia Munoz, who led the intergovernmental affairs office for five years under Obama, said early on that Rodriguez got the job now because she is “Julie” — not because she is a Chavez.
“Being a Chavez is part of who she is,” Munoz said, adding that she got the White House job “because she is so skilled and has such deep integrity.”
And because Biden wanted her on his team.
Rodriguez is among a group of Latinas serving in the White House and advising Biden on matters ranging from communications to policy. Latino advocates had accused Biden during the 2020 presidential campaign of not doing enough to reach out to these voters.
Rodriguez has emerged as one of Biden’s most trusted advisers, nurturing relationships with state and local officials that aides believe will be helpful throughout the campaign.
She also has developed a close working relationship with Biden’s coterie of senior political advisers, including Anita Dunn and deputy chief of staff Jen O’Malley Dillon, who are set to help steer Biden’s reelection effort from the White House.
