FORMER US AMBASSADOR TO MEXICO WEDS BROWNSVILLE MD

By Juan Montoya

Close friends of former U.S. Ambassador to Mexico have contacted El Rrun-Rrun and confirmed that Tony Garza, also a former Cameron County Judge, has married for a second time to a Brownsville native.
But although initial reports indicated that his bride was – like him a a St. Joseph Academy grad – we have been corrected and learn that she was a Pace High School alum.
Close friends have, on condition of anonymity, have informed us that the private ceremony took place in June, after which they spent three weeks traveling.
The bride's name is Liz Beightler, formerly Atkinson.
But as Garza likes to say, while he barely scraped through high school at St. Joe. ('77), she graduated a year later ('78) from Pace as that year's Valedictorian.
She was also a state semi-finalist in tennis and voted most beautiful.
They met that summer and dated while in college at UT-Austin. She studied Engineering. Tony studied Business.
He likes to say that "she graduated 'summa cum laude', and he 'con summa dificultad'".
They went their separate ways in 1980; she to be amongst the top students at her medical school. Tony to law school. According to their close friends, while, they hadn't spoken in nearly 3 decades, their reconnect later in their careers made them both very happy.
She has three children and is widowed. Tony is divorced. They both have had full lives. Garza, formerly ambassador of the U.S. to that country, is practicing law in Mexico City as counsel with a New York based Law Firm.
She has built a very successful medical practice here in Texas. They both plan doing what they're doing.
Garza keeps an eye on the binational relationship between the US and Mexico. Here's a sampling from his website:
"It's only every twelve years that the US and Mexico hold presidential elections in the same year. For me, living through and experiencing these two pivotal elections has been tremendously interesting, and with trade between the U.S. and Mexico surging up 17 percent in 2011 to a record $461 billion, our economic relationship has never been more integrated.
In Mexico, expectations are high and the transition to the new administration is well underway. Incoming PRI President-Elect, Enrique Peña Nieto, who this month (took) a goodwill tour of Latin America, will be sworn into office December 1.
"The good good are that Mexico has become the preferred centre of manufacturing for multinational companies looking to supply Americas and, increasingly, beyond.
Today, Mexico exports more manufactured products than the rest of Latin America put together." 
Felicidades Mr. and Mrs. Ambassador from all your friends in South Texas!
To keep up with Tony, go to: www.tonygarza.com