Now push has come to shove.
After the dust settled on the 2012 primaries, it has become clear that there will be yet more bare-knuckle fights for the next 60 days in contests ranging from the congressional nominations of both parties to constables and justice of the peace races locally.
Starting with the Democratic congressional race where Filemon Vela Jr. riding on his family's coattails in the Democratic Party easily outdrew his seven other opponents garnering 18,223 votes while former Solomon Ortiz aide Denise (Saenz) Blanchard received 5,805. It is difficult to see how Blanchard hopes to make up the almost 3 to 1 deficit despite her stated "passion" to serve.
Expect Blanchard to bare her claws and try to tap anti-Republican sentiment in her party by pointing out Vela's obvious GOP ties such as his wife Rose running for Chief Justice of the 13th Court of Appeals as a Republican against Roy Valdez, the Democrat.
It's interesting to note, however, that Vela garnered a full 9,791 votes in Cameron County alone. Just about half of his total came from the other parts of the district extending all the way to Gonzales County. Blanchard, on the other hand, got a measly 2,994 from here.
On the Republican side, Texas Southmost College trustee Adela Garza and Jessica P. Bradshaw are caught in a death embrace to see who will face either Vela or, in an upset, Blanchard. With only 200 or so votes separating them (Garza 4,566 to Bradshaw's 4,364), the race will determine who the Republican voters in the new district want to go against Vela Jr., who displays photos of his late father, a federal judge, and his mama, a former City of Brownsville mayor, who is also listed as the treasurer for a Republican Texas State Representative in Nueces County and has contributed thousands of dollars to Republican candidates to defeat Democrats. Regardless, Blanchard faces an uphill fight against Vela unless serious money from nationwide Demo PACs becomes a factor.
Who will carry their banner against the Demos.
Will it be Garza, who has served some 30 years on local public boards or Bradshaw, who comes down to Browntown to reestablish her Hispanic roots and Brownsville residence every two years in time to run for office?
The voting in Cameron County was tight, with Garza taking her home county by 149 votes (1,956 to 1,807). The other candidate, Paul B. Haring got 1,291 votes in Cameron County out of the total of 3,675 in the entire district.
An encouraging note was the result of the Texas State Board of Education (District 2) where former Brownsville Independent School District trustee Ruben Cortez went down before San Benito city commissioner and San Benito CISD trustee Celeste Zarate Sanchez by a total of 30,592 to 24,176.
The other candidate, Larry Garza, of Kingsville, pulled a respectable 13,889. Both of Cortez's opponents are longtime educators and many wondered why the Texas State Teachers Association had bucked the system and endorsed Cortez over such obviously better qualified candidates. In fact, the rank and file ignored George Borrego, president of the Association of Brownsville Educators, whose board endorsed Cortez, with only a high school diploma.
We understand that Garza might endorse Sanchez in the coming weeks. Even with his past service on the BISD board, Sanchez beat Cortez in Cameron County by a vote of 9,738 to 6,907, a respectable margin of nearly 3,000 votes.
We ran into Cortez at the Rene Oliveira confab where he was still meetin' and greetin' in preparation for the runoff. For some reason or other, he walked right by us
and didn't even say hello. Now, why would that be?
In the other runoff races that remain, former Cameron County Ass. DA Carlos Masso beat out former DA Luis Saenz and fellow DA Maria De Ford. Masso's 8,072 votes were just 306 over Saenz's 7,766. Included in that total are an astounding 192 mail-in votes for Masso, the second-highest total after the 211 mail-in votes cast for Arturo C. Nelson, who won the race for 138th District Judge over Veronica Farias.
The mail-in total seemed suspicious to Citizens Against Voter Abuse (CAVA) activist Mary Helen Flores, who said her group would be analyzing the results and would take actions against anyone identified as being part of a vote "harvesting" activities involving paid politiqueras who charged for delivering the mail-in votes to candidates.
De Ford, who signed CAVA's "no paid politquera" pledge, garnered 6,672 votes, only 33 of which were mail-in votes. Saenz garnered only 47 mail-in votes.
Sheriff Omar Lucio also beat his Democratic opponents Joe Cisneros and Terry Vinson without the need of a runoff with a whopping 60.06 percent of the vote, plus the ubiquitous 191 mail-in votes. Cisneros got 55 mail-in votes and Vinson got only 25. Lucio faces Republican Santiago "Jimmy" Manrriquez in November. Jimmy got only 3,528 votes in his party's primary as the only candidate for the position.
Another candidate who won't need a runoff was Pct. 1 commissioner Sofia Benavides whose 69.42 percent of the vote (3,296) include 11o mail-in votes and easily topped her challenger Fausto (Pato) Martinez's 1,452 votes. Martinez garnered 69 mail-in votes.
The race for Justice of the Peace 2-2 came down to a surprising conclusion with the predicted runoff between Yolanda Teran Begum and Erin Hernandez Garcia. Begum's 2,960 votes beat Erin's 2,507. Javier Hernandez came in a surprising (and close) third with 2,298. After that Refugio "Cookie" Covarrubias placed fourth with 1,891.
Yet, many observers expected the mail-in votes to give Erin Hernandez a boost and it did not happen. She got only 30 mail-in votes compared to Begum's 20 and Javier Hernandez's 11. Cookie, however, apparently took the bait from the politiqueras and plunked down his $125 a week to get the 110 mail-in votes on the ledger.
"It's obvious that the Ernie Hernandez clan got the message on mail-in votes and had the ladies walk in their mail-in vote instead," said a voter at a victory party. "Even with that vote, Erin did not win. Now they have to be looking at the 190-plus mail-in votes that were cast in the other races like Masso's and Lucio's and wondering if they should bite. If things get desperate, I am betting they will."
"I had some of those ladies come talk to me about selling me their mail-in votes and I told them that I would rather that they introduce me to the voters so that I could explain my stand on the issues and let them decide whether they would want to support me," said Begum. "Not one of them accepted my offer."
Constable Pete Avila will also be in a runoff with former constable for Pct. 2 Abel Gomez. The pair came in close with Avila's 3,952 barely outdistancing Gomez's 3,267. Juan Torres came in with 2,348 and Roel Arreola drew only 893 votes, only 8.4 percent of the total.
As in the other cases involving mail-in ballots, Gomez got 191 mail-in ballots compared to Avila's 27.
The obvious disparity in the mail-in ballots did not escape the eye of CAVA's Mary Helen Flores, who noted that she found it particularly disheartening to see that some judicial candidates obviously had found the numbers offered by mail-in votes too tempting to pass up. She noted that Rebecca Rubane, with 144 mail-in votes, Rolando Olvera, with 145 and David Sanchez, with 145 votes indicated to her that they had been acquired by the same person.
"Neither Olvera nor Sanchez had an opponent," she said. "They had no need to even go after the mail-in votes."
In her Facebook page Citizens Against Voter Abuse Cameron County, she lays out the disturbing pattern of what appears to be some candidates getting the same votes from the same people. In particular, she noted that the name of politiquera Tomasita Chavez and her daughter Ardiana Garza kept cropping up in "assisted voting" notations on the mail-in ballots that went to law enforcement candidates like Lucio, Gomez, and Masso each with 191, 191, and 192, respectively.
"I had to get out of town today and get away from that mess," Flores said in a telephone call from Bayview. "But once I get back we're going to have to ask these candidates, especially the judges, why they continue to do this."
13 comments:
Go Filemon Vela!!!
It's fabulous to see a new face for the Democrats, not tied to Gilbert Hinojosa - Abel Limas - Solomon Ortiz corrupt machine. It's about time! Good luck!
"It's obvious that the Ernie Hernandez clan got the message on mail-in votes and had the ladies walk in their mail-in vote instead," said a voter at a victory party. "Even with that vote, Erin did not win. Now they have to be looking at the 190-plus mail-in votes that were
cast in the other races like Masso's and Lucio's and wondering if they should bite. If things get desperate, I am betting they will."
No one wants another Hernandez Cadriel in office! Fully expect every single JP candidate to endorse Begum in the next few weeks.
Will you look at the MAMs on that one. Won't you?
Vela vs. Blanchard? A bitch fight extraordinaire!!!
Mary Helen showing cleavage
Go Denise Saenz-Blanchard!!!
It's great to see a NON-ATTORNEY face for the Democrats.
It's about time. Look at all the mess the county, state, and country is in. SUPPORT NON-ATTORNEY CANDIDATES.
Politiqueras/ politiqueros has been around for ages and some people think they can stop that moment? No way you are wasting your time but in reality the fingers should point to the candidates because they are the ones who hire them and use them. Shown me a candiate that says he/she doesnt use them and i will show you a liar. chango
gflores people get paid to do this work and they dont do it for free just ask hermina becerra she has been doing it for ages chango
Mr. Barrera..you sir are disrespectful by making such a comment. You are also a hypocrite, you don't like mexicans but you sure enjoy looking at their body parts. Shame on you; you sick, old man.
"Go Denise Saenz-Blanchard!!!
It's great to see a NON-ATTORNEY face for the Democrats."
HEYYYYYY Denise.... are you ditching attorney ERIN HERNANDEZ for the winner YOLANDA BEGUM?!?!? LOL you "Iron Ladies" were supposed stuck together to the end, no??
Jumping like a democRATA from the Hernandez sinking ship!!!
HA HA HA HA
(
barrera you rock man, if bitch does not like the attention cover them up. those tetas look good....
who is cadriel??
(You are also a hypocrite, you don't like mexicans but you sure enjoy looking at their body parts. Shame on you; you sick, old man.)
My mother was born in Mexico, but before RIPing, she ensured that all of her offspring went to the INS (Immigration and Naturalization) office and went through the process of naturalization. BTW, the next time you see me by the expressway, I'll be the one wearing my blue tie. Wave to me and maybe I will see you later at the Toucan's for a beer, huh?
I would like to suck Mary Helen's MAMs all day. I still think she's a wetback though. If I can find my viagra I will make many proud American babies with her. Give me your number Mary Helen.
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