THERE'S BEEN A SHIFT IN THE COUNTY'S POLITICAL SANDS

By Juan Montoya
In a sign of the shifting alliances in Cameron County politics, one of our three readers has sent us a photo which shows a potential combination of forces that is sure to make some current office holders slightly nervous.
Our reads said that the gents at the photo on top (L-R Carlos Masso, current Brownsville Navigation District commissioner and candidate for Cameron County District Attorney, Lucino Rosenbaum III, a county clerk office employee whose mother Bea Rosenbaum is challenging Pct. 1 commissioner Sofia Benavides, former county clerk Joe Rivera, who narrowly missed out in being appointed county clerk by the commissioners court when Carlos Cascos left town, and Steve Guerra, a former candidate for the BND) were planning the strategy to unite forces in their respective races for the March 1, 2016 Democratic Party primary.
As a sign of how much alliances have shifted in the last four years, it is interesting to note that Rosenbaum and Rivera supported incumbent DA Luis V. Saenz in the 2012 election. Now, it appears, Saenz has some work to do to overcome their apparent change of loyalties in favor of his challenger.
Rivera and the Rosenbaum family worked in the barrio trenches for Saenz. Rivera worked hard to introduce Saenz to the outlying county areas that he knows like the back of his hand. It was the support from Saenz in the rural county precincts that allowed him to overcome his deficiencies in urban areas of Brownsville.
Likewise, Masso enjoys broad support with the community leaders at Cameron Park, where he and Pct. 2 Constable Abel Gomez swept four years ago. Gomez is seeking re-election and has at least two candidates running against him, including former constable Pete Avila.
And the Rosenbaums held well-attended pachangas for Saenz in the Southmost area where the family has operated several businesses. The elder Rosenbaum, Lucino Jr., was a county commissioner for eight years before the late Pete Benavides took office. Former county judge Gilberto Hinojosa – now chairman of the Texas Democratic Party – appointed Sofia to her husband's position after his sudden demise. She took office in 2006 and won re-election. She is seeking re-election in the 2016 primary after having served 10 years.
Will Saenz and Benavides be able to overcome the apparent bloc being formed by Rivera, a former county official with some 36 years of service in the county and numerous won elections? And will the apparent alliances between Masso, Rosenbaum and Rivera translate into a victory for Rosenbaum? She has been a Port of Brownsville employee for the past 42 years where Masso is now commissioner. Her son Lucino III was hired by Rivera and still works at the county clerk's office.
We understand that more candidates might jump into the Pct. 1 commissioner's race, further muddying the waters. One name that keeps coming up is the one of Fausto "El Pato" Martinez, a Southmost candidate who has run for the position against Benavides before. There is also a rumor making the rounds that there will be yet another candidate for that office who has the support of the anti-LNG constituency who collected 600 signatures on a petition against the introduction of export terminals at the port and the granting of tax abatements to the companies.
But what the incumbents in both the DA and commissioner's can be sure of is that it will not be a cakewalk this time around since the shifting political sands out there can quickly turn a political career into a quagmire.