TANGLED WEB AT ELECTIONS: WILL FRAUD GO ON AS USUAL?

By Juan Montoya
Retired federal employee Robert Gracia must have felt frustrated when he went to vote at Cristo Rey Catholic Church last Wednesday on Southmost Road and saw a politiquero fill in seven ballots for the candidates who were paying him to herd elderly and mentally-disabled voters to the polling places.
The politiqueros were handing their charges marked ballots with large arrows pointing at candidates Erin Hernandez garcia, Carlos Masso and Abel Gomez. All three are in runoff races against Yolanda Begum, for JP 2-2, District Attorney, and Constable Pc.t, respectively.
Suddenly, his one vote had been cancelled and trumped by seven votes who did not even know who they voted for. The polling place judges had simply allowed the politiquero to fill in the voting ballots and initial the ballots to indicate that he had filled them in for the people in the waiting van.
"It was gross," Gracia told the local daily.
That scene was repeated 10 or 20 times daily during the five-day early voting period under the noses – and with the acquiescence of – Elections Administrator Roger Ortiz and the judges at the various polling places. And, in fact, the packing of these illegal votes because they can't be characterized as anything else.
And just as Gracia's vote was cancelled out twenty-times fold during the early voting period, so were the other 50 or 60 votes that were cast by voters who went to the early-voting period polling sites on their own. If predictions hold true for the low turnout projected for the runoff elections Tuesday, those hauled-in votes – plus the hundreds of mail-in votes that traditionally impact the totals every election cycle – might decide the outcome of legal voters who cast their votes without the undue influence of paid ward heelers blemishing their ballots.
The role of politiquera Herminia Becerra has perhaps been overstated. Loud, sometimes abrasive, she has become the poster child of Cameron County politiqueras. Perhaps more insidious is the role played by Norma Hernandez, Amadeo Rodriguez Jr., and Ortiz himself.
Becerra will egg on opponents about how she has already brought in more than "200." "300," "400," and sometimes even "700," votes to the runoff election. Take it with a grain of salt. In any event, after working the Cameron County system for more than a half century, she might be good for anywhere from 100 to 150 write-in and walk-in voters.
"Los tres mios van a ganar," she boasted Monday from in front of the courthouse.
Hernandez is quite another cup of tea. She has made an industry of milking write-in ballots from the elderly by a fastidious practice of registering them to vote when they come into the adult day care centers, periodically updating her lists and when election time comes around, herding them off to the polls to collect for her troubles.
This year she has been brazen in her "harvesting" of these elderly votes. You see, this time it is not her husband Ernie, the Cameron County Pct. 2 Commissioner, who is running. Rather, it is her daughter Erin who is in a runoff with surging populist Yolanda Begum. Erin – despite her protests – ridiculed Begum's Mexico roots through a handful of proxies. First it was her Spanish accent that drew their spite, then her education, and then even the way she wore her make up.
Now, in her latest Sunday ad, she states plaintively that she is running on her "merits."
We should ask, why on earth would a successful attorney opt to run for a position that pays peanuts compared to the wages a good lawyer could earn? Some, as we have learned, clear that much in single case or referral.
For Erin to say that she wants to "raise the bar" for JPs in the county is ludicrous, since she could have run against Linda Salazar, the JP 2-1 next door who really has a Spanish accent, little or no education, and whose social graces leave quite a bit to be desired. No, Erin, uplift the bench is not what comes to mind when one thinks of the Erin Hernandez candidacy. What one thinks is that your dad and mom need someone at the JPs position to dispense favors and facilitate the eventual candidacy of Ernie Hernandez for county judge. Having someone at the JPs office would make it that much easier to curry the favor of Cameron County residents.
Because think about this. If Erin had decided to run against Salazar, she would have been running for a four-year term. As it is, when she decided to run for the JP 2-2 position, she was running for the unexpired term of Tony Torres, whose term would have been over in 2013. If she takes over in January 2013, she will have to run a year following her inauguration.
Now on to Amadeo Rodriguez Jr. And let me make it clear right now that we are not talking about Amadeo Sr., a bondsman who also holds the county's coffee shop contract and has so far kept clean of the ongoing Limas scandal and the current voting anomalies. Commissioners recently voted to extend the his coffee shop contract.
Rodriguez Jr. was the one who was named by a day-care provider as the one responsible – along with Norma Hernandez – of trying to force elderly residents onto waiting vans and ferrying them to the voting places to cast their votes according to the pre-marked sample ballots they handed them when they were on board.
Amadeo III, his son, is the nephew of Sylvia Rodriguez, the administrative assistant to JP 2-1 Linda Salazar. (We originally reported that Amadeo III was a county employee, but have since found out that he does not. We stand corrected). Adriana Villarreal, who works for the county, his girlfriend, is in charge of managing and supervising elections judges during elections.
The web gets even more tangled when one realizes that another Rodriguez sibling (Joanne Rodriguez Gonzales)  works in the county warehouse. During elections, her husband, Freddie Gonzales, who is disabled, is hired to help out.
Is it any wonder then, that Amadeo Jr., who was named as one of those hauling elderly and infirm voters to the polls from day care centers and old-folks homes, can breezily traipse in the elections office with nary a care in the world? His candidate Erin Hernandez Garcia is the commissioner's daughter and his siblings and immediate relatives virtually run the elections. His girlfriend does payroll for Sheriff Omar Lucio.
Who's going to challenge him on anything he does?
As we have said previously, the votes have been packed in already. Ortiz chose to look the other way to protect his job.
Retired federal employee Robert Gracia did his civic duty by speaking out against the voter fraud he had witnessed. Local attorney Ed Stapleton bought a half-page ad and pointed out Erin's lack of legal professionalism in making unfounded charges against a fellow attorney. Citizens Against Voter Abuse's (CAVA) Mary Helen Flores has studiously shown how the mail-in voting process has been subverted by Norma Hernandez for her family's benefit.
Judges will not overturn elections. And the only thing standing between voting fraud determining the outcome of these elections and a free and fair contest is for those who chose not to vote to simply walk in on election day (tomorrow) and in no uncertain terms defeat the fraud by simply voting.
You can either allow the Hernandezs, Becerra and the Rodriguezs decide the outcome or you can choose to take a stand.
It's that simple.