Julián Castro this week set in motion a 50-state campaign strategy reminiscent of Democratic tactics a decade ago, traveling to Idaho and Utah in a campaign gambit that could set him apart from others seeking the Democratic nomination for president.

Veteran political operatives like to say it’s essential for a presidential hopeful, especially one who is not well known, to focus on the early primary season states. The primary season begins in February with contests in Iowa and New Hampshire, followed by Nevada and South Carolina.

Yet Castro campaigned this week in two western states where Democrats haven’t prevailed in a presidential election in more than 50 years.

“There are other campaigns and consultants who say that if you’re not spending all your time in early states, you’re not serious about running for president. We absolutely disagree with that assessment,” said Jennifer Fiore, Castro’s senior adviser for communications and digital.

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An early measure of success of the strategy might be the crowd Castro turned out on Tuesday evening in Idaho when 600 people showed up at Boise State University to hear Castro, a former San Antonio mayor and housing secretary in the Obama administration.

“Just because people live in a red state like Idaho doesn’t mean voters in Idaho don’t have a voice. It doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t hear about health care, immigration and other issues,” Fiore said.

In early 2005, Howard Dean, who became Democratic national chairman after an unsuccessful bid for his party’s nomination, announced a 50-state effort designed to build the party and recruit candidates across the country. His strategy met criticism party for diverting resources away from where Democratic candidates have better chances to win.

Nonetheless, the next four years under Dean proved to be a successful period for Democrats, including the election of Barack Obama as president.

Castro views the decision to campaign nationwide as an organizing tool in a new era in which campaigns and fundraising have become largely national, and a means to set himself apart from the big and growing Democratic field.

Castro also was the first Democratic hopeful to approve paying campaign interns a $15 an-hour salary and to support unionization of staff members, if they choose.

Castro waded deeper this week into the controversial issue of reparations — payments to descendants of slaves — which has emerged as a topic of conversation among several Democratic presidential hopefuls.

Referring to the “original sin of slavery,” Castro said that as president he would establish a task force to consider how reparations might be carried out.

“I know that there’s a lot of disagreement both about whether it should be done and if it were done, how it would be done. And I’m not naïve about that. But I do think that dark clouds still hang over our country,” Castro said, speaking on MSNBC.

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Castro’s campaign enters another phase this week with new staff members scheduled to report on Friday in San Antonio, where Castro’s campaign will be housed.

But they may be working out of coffee shops and hotel rooms for the time being because the campaign has yet to sign a lease on a headquarters, a Castro aide said.

Among the Castro campaign staff members reporting to San Antonio are campaign manager Maya Rupert, one of several staff members who worked alongside Castro at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which he headed in the Obama administration.

Other former HUD employees on Castro’s staff are Fiore and Sawyer Hackett, deputy national press secretary. Hackett will be based in San Antonio and Fiore in Washington.

Castro this week announced more campaign hires: Greg Diamond, a former Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee operative, as chief operating officer; Natalie Montelongo, an ACLU strategist, as political director; and Shereen Zaid, from the Texas Democratic Party, as scheduling and advance director. They will be based in San Antonio.