WHO TO BLAME? POLITIQUERAS, THOSE WHO HIRE THEM, OR NON-VOTERS?

"The woman asked what she was supposed to do with all the mail-in votes she and her friends had collected for the race. She showed me three large HEB paper shopping bags filled to the top with the yellow envelopes."

By Juan Montoya

I recall that in one of my former lifetimes I was helping a candidate run for countywide office putting up his signs in the Southmost area.
I noticed a house caddy corner from Canales Elementary on the corner of Cleveland and Hortencia, by the school's big gate where voters entered the school grounds to vote. There were already several political signs on the fence, including one of my candidate's opponent. I decided to enter the home and ask permission to place the sign.

The home was overgrown with foliage, and a brick-lined walk led to the door. I knocked. Soon, an elderly woman appeared and I identified myself and asked for her permission. She readily agreed.

I thanked her, and, as an afterthought, asked her if she had voted early in the election.

"Ya vino la señora por el poll tax," she answered. (The lady already came for my mail-in vote.)

Do you know who you voted for? I asked her in Spanish.

"No se, ella lo llena," she answered. ( I don't know. She fills it out.)

At that moment, I knew that if the politiquera who picked up her early mailing envelope was supporting my candidate's opponent (and in all probability she was), my vote was negated by the elderly lady at the door who had no idea who the politiquera had cast her vote for.

During this election cycle I happened to be present when a former elected official met with an aspiring candidate for public office and candidly told him that unless he paid for the politiquera votes he might as well give up on getting the mail-in votes.
"You got to play dirty if you want to win," he told him earnestly over his protests that he would be no different than the other politicians who court (and pay) for the politiquera votes.
"Once you get elected you can worry about that," he said. "Right now your focus is on getting elected. That's the way it is."
Like it or not, the mail-in voting can sometimes (though not always) swing local elections. In the case of the recent Cameron County Judge's election it almost did, until good math overturned the chicanery going on in the county's elections office. After all, one politiquera can garner 69 mail-in votes, or can claim she does.
Herminia Becerra, known as the Queen of Politiqueras, claims she can get 200 mail-in votes on her own. Maggie Ozuna can claim the same, as can Rose Melendez, who shuns the term politiquera for the more politically correct "political activist" moniker on her business cards (yes, she does have business cards).
Of course, ask any number of failed candidates and they will tell you that they have paid these ladies (and others) to harvest the mail-in votes only to find that the gals were double dealing all the candidates when the results come in. By then, of course, it is too late for them to do anything about it.
Ruben Peña, who ran against Ernie Hernandez for commissioner of precinct 2, started to lead a crusade against politiqueras and even dragged some into court. He failed to convince the court that the votes decided the outcome of the election and, as judges are loathe to do, did not overturn the decision of the electorate.
But Peña's stand against these ladies is questionable. His mother in law, Blanca Vela, ran for mayor of Brownsville (and won) using these same votes. In fact, so did the local DA, the members of the judiciary, and just about every other law enforcement elected official in South Texas.
How true his commitment to eradicate the role of these ladies? During the last go-round in the city elections, Tony Zavaleta asked for his help and involvement in ferreting out the tainted votes in his runoff with John Villarreal. Peña's lukewarm response to his plea indicated that he was only concerned about the "cancer" when it involved his political aspirations, not others'.
The mail-in process is pretty straightforward. When the time comes, a person files an application for a mail-in form with the elections office. The elections office sends them the yellow voting package containing the ballot (el poll tax), they fill in their ballot and mail it in.
But if a politiquera ( or others like Norma Hernandez is said to do), has intruded in the process and nurtured the vote (usually an elderly person's), the person calls them when the poll tax arrives in the mail, they rush over there, fill out their selections, and mail it themselves. All they get the voter to do is to sign her name on the bottom. Presto, you have a vote for your slate of candidates.

The reason the ladies mail it themselves is because the savvy candidates demand to see the ballots before they are sealed so they can ascertain that they are getting that vote.

Sometimes, a candidate (usually a Democrat), is the unwitting recipient of the politiquera vote. Such was the case when Bob Krueger ran against Kay Bailey Hutchison in a special election in 1993. I was working for Cameron County then and I got a call from one of our political supporters. The woman asked what she was supposed to do with all the mail-in votes she and her friends had collected for the race. She showed me three large HEB paper shopping bags filled to the top with the yellow envelopes.

I was at a loss since there was very little interest in the race within the Cameron County Democratic Party. But since the ladies wanted to know who would pay for the stamps to mail in the envelopes, I contacted just about every heavyweight Democrat in the county. No one wanted to put in the $250 or so needed to mail the ballots even though the Krueger campaign had sent the party money to help his senate bid.

Finally, through the intercession of several elected officials, I was able to provide the ladies with the stamps they needed to send the ballots. Krueger won the mail-in voting in Cameron County, although he was bested by nearly 1 million votes and a 2-1 ratio in the special election.

Is there a lesson here?

Yes. The mail-in politiquera vote can be overwhelmed if more people vote and overturn their influence by changing the historically low turnout in this county.