AS VOTER FRAUD PROBE WIDENS, POLITIQUEROS AND SOME CANDIDATES HEAR FOOTSTEPS

By Juan Montoya
Now that the state of Texas and the U.S. Attorney voter fraud task force is beginning to produce indictments, there should be numerous people in town who are hearing footsteps behind them.
So far, eight women have been charged with voter fraud through the manipulation of mail-in ballots. Those eight are charged with a number of  illegal acts in the assisting and preparation of the ballots during the 2012 runoff election of the Democratic Party.
During those elections, several candidates running as a slate garnered the majority of the mail-in votes, including Carlos Masso, (345), Abelardo Gomez (415) and Erin Garcia Hernandez (319).

Otheres who were the beneficiaries of the mail-in ballots were Ruben Cortez (407) and Denise Blamchard (293). Masso was running against Luiis Saenz for Cameron County District Attorney. Gomez was running against Pete Avila for Precinct 2 Constable. and Garcia Hernandez was running for Justice of the Peace, Precinct 2, Place 2. Cortez was running against Celeste Sanchez for the Texas State Board of Education and  Blanchard was running for the the District 27 U.S. Representative seat against Filemon Vela, Jr.
During the heat of battle in the Garcia-Hernandez-Begum race, Norma Hernandez (Erin's mother) posed with a group of her politiqueras, including Sara Perales (behind Norma), one of the women named in the indictment. Hermiinia Becerra, pictured on the right (Norma's left) said she had spoken to investigators but has not been indicted. As of this writing, neither had Norma Hernandez.
In at least two of those runoff races (Gomez vs. Avila and Begum vs. Garcia-Hernandez) the mail-in votes decided the outcome. For example, Gomez's total vote of 4,352 against Avila's 4,000 gave him a 352 vote advantage. His 415 mail-in votes far outstripped Avila's 57, a 358 vote difference.
Likewise, Garcia-Hernandez's 4,316 total votes beat Begum's 4,165  by 151 votes. However, her 319 mail-in votes compared to her opponent's 142 mail-in votes gave her the critical 177 votes to put her over the top.
As a result of interviews with some of the people who voted by mail Begum volunteers and supporters – including Citizens Against Voter Abuse under Mary Helen Flores and voting statistician Laura Miniel –
a Powerpoint presentation depicting how those voters, by precinct, determined the outcome of the election.
The team presented the evidence including taped interviews to the Texas Rangers, investigators with the Texas Attorney General, and agents with the U.S. Attorney's Office.
That, in turn, led to the formation of the joint voter fraud task force in which staff of the Cameron County District Attorney's Office also played a role.
Those who have seen some of the presentation say that proof abounds of outright fraud, manipulation of ballots, cases where one person is listed as having assisted numerous voters even though the voters do not even know the person who supposedly mailed the ballots for them. In others, an illiterate woman and her family is interviewed telling volunteers that she could neither read nor write but that "una señora" at a local adult day-care center filled out the ballot application for her and then showed up to collect it at her home.
"Ella fue la que firmo," she said.

When she was shown a photo of a number of politiqueras associated with the Ernie-Norma and Erin Garcia-Hernandez vote harvesting group, she pointed out one of the eight women who were named in the indictments Wednesday. Still not named in any indictments are a half-dozen other Hernandez operatives like Joey Garza (dealing cards in a Erin casino function in the photo) and father-in-law Ralph Elizondo. Both of their names appear on the envelopes mailed to the Cameron County Elections Office although tghe voters interviewed maintain that it was not them who picked up the ballots.
Still, other voters told the volunteers that they had just handed the signed (but unmarked) ballot to some of the ladies and they had taken them away to mail it on their behalf.
With the possibility of serving jail time if convicted of the charges, it will be interesting to see whether some may try to cut a deal with prosecutors and identify the people who paid them to harvest the votes. Sources at the DA's Office say that four of the six women indicted this week told the court that they would be represented by Masso, but he never showed up at their arraignment and bond hearing. It's doubtful that Masso will be able to represent them because he might possibly be subpoenaed as a witness in the case against some of the women, the said.
Prosecutors for the state have indicated that they are also targeting the candidates who may have paid the politiqueras and politiqueros to collect the fraudulent votes.