REMEMBER WAY BACK WHEN THE DEMOCRATS WERE "UNITED"? NOW THEY ARE NOT THE ONE HAPPY FAMILY

By Juan Montoya
Rewind the video back to 2010.
Precinct 2 commissioner John  Wood was making a credible run for the county judgeship against incumbent Carlos Cascos.
Backing Wood were the top dawgs of the Democratic party, including current Texas Democratic Party chairman (and a former county judge himself) Gilbert Hinojosa. The presuntos implicados (usual suspects) included disgraced former county commissioner Ernie Hernandez, Joe Rivera, Pete Avila, Omar Lucio, Sen. Eddie Lucio and his son Eddie Lucio III (there's three of them?), Aurora de la Garza, Sofia Benavides, and David Betancourt.
Where are they now?
Hernandez was indicted on seven counts of official misconduct and one count of coercion of a public official and had to resign. Cameron County D.A. Luis Saenz offered – and Ernie jumped at the chance and happily accepted – a plea bargain where he pleaded guilty to the one count of coercion and got deferred adjudication. It involved him interceding on behalf of an owner of some confiscated maquinitas and asking then Emergency Management Coordinator Humberto Barrera to get them back. Apparently, Barrera was known for his ability to make that happen, after the appropriate fines had been paid, of course.
Ernie has since served his time and is now free to run for public office and sin again. You can;t see his left hand, but it's right next to Rivera's back pocket.
Rivera, the svelte guy in the red playera next to Ernie and onetime best looking county clerk in Texas, was talked into running for county judge by Hinojosa, who in turn talked Sylvia Garza Perez (not in the picture yet) into dropping out of the judge's race and run for Joe's position. Everything worked out right for everyone, except for Joe. The happy comradeship that is portrayed above did not materialize in the 2014 race and Rivera was out of a job after 36 years. Garza Perez won and is now county clerk. One of the principal politicians in the county, DA Luis Saenz, apparently struck up a bond with Republican Cascos and even swore him in when he won. He later attended Cascos' swearing in in Austin when Gov. Greg Abbott picked him for the spot.
Pete Avila, between Rivera and Omar Lucio, was a Pct. 2 constable and later lost to Abel Gomez (also not in the picture). Pete's political career was sidetracked momentarily when he ran for justice of the peace 2-2 and lost to Mary Esther Garcia-Sorola (also not in the picture, yet). He is now running for his old constable spot against Gomez and at least two other candidates, including Silverio "Silver" Cisneros and Juan Torres. He blames Mary Esther's mom (Sofia Benavides) for divulging the fact that the county had to pay $150,000 to his former secretary Melinda Henderson on a sexual harassment lawsuit. Avila claims that it was Sofia who pushed him to hire Henderson in the first place. He is now spreading the word that Benavides' decision to sign off the construction of a hotel on Isla Blanca Park in South Padre Island  that resulted in the county getting a verdict which will cost $21 million.
Sofie, too, has earned the umbrage of the svelte former county clerk in the red playera. She, after all, made the motion to appoint Pete Sepulveda as county judge when logically, since Rivera lost to Cascos in the general election in 2014, should have been a shoo in for county judge. In a recent post, he is pictured with Rosenbaum's son and Carlos Masso, Saenz's opponent in the March 1, 2016 primary. They're starting to line up for the big dance.
Sheriff Omar Lucio is running once again, one of the most durable septuagenarians in local politics. He faces a number of candidates, including former Rio Hondo police chief John Chambers, former DA investigator Victor Cortez and Robert Rodriguez. And that's just the Republicans. Especially galling to Omar Lucio is the fact that Cortez apparently has the wholehearted support of his former boss DA Saenz. Lcui would probably prefer to face Chambers next November in the general election and is said to have info on Cortez that might derail his bid. We'll see.
What can we say about Eddie Lucio and son Eddie III?  They see elected office as their personal entitlement and have made a decent living selling off bits of the pubic trust to the highest bidder. Noweher is the saying that a moderate Democrat in South Texas is the same as a rabid North Texas Republican. Lucio Sr. voted to restrict abortions to poor women even in the case of rape and incest and has sided with his Republican buddies to the point where his voting is practically indistinguishable from a Republican's.
Eddie III's performance (when he's not hamming it up on stage) is about par for the course. Although he is a lawyer, most of his clients pay him (like good old dad) for "consulting" and softening up the various public entities in his district for them. "We will sell no office before its time" is the Lucio motto.
And then we have Aurorita. She (thanks God) is no longer in the picture, either. She apparently got the memo that she had outworn her welcome at the District Clerk's office. That spot is now filled by Eric Garza, one of her former employees. Everyone wonders how our Aurorita slithered away unscathed from the Abel Limas-Jim Solis-Mark Rosenthal-Armando Villalobos corruption scandal since her office was the one that dished out the cases to Limas' court. That, on top of the slap in the hand she was able to wrangle for son Joey after he got caught pilfering more than $100,000 from the dying over at Sunshine Haven hospice, made her an Aurora non grata. She read the writing on the wall, cooperated with the feds, and rode off into the sunset on her suffering steed. You can almost her her incessant dirge "Ay, my poor girls work so haaaard."
Sofie next to her has been at the helm of Pct. 1 for a decade after she was appointed to fill the unexpired term of her expired husband Pete. She ahs survived two elections and is now facing at least three opponents for her position. They are Bea Rosenbaum, Fausto "El Pato" Martinez, and newcomer Joseph Cantu. Rosenbaum is the wife of former commissioner Lucino Rosenbaum. Martinez is a Southmost businessman who has tried this in the past. Cantu is an Air Force veteran and a successful business guy who is adamant about stopping the construction of the LNG plants on the Brownsville Ship Channel. There will be blood on the streets in this race.
And what can we say about our buddy David? Milquetoast and discreet, Betancourt has served as a city commissioner and now as county treasurer where he tried his best not to be noticed.
However, his tenure at the Greater Brownsville Incentives Corporation had been marked by his free-wheeling nature and his generosity toward Oscar Garcia Jr. and his "studies" proposals. Only public outcry about the worthless nature of those studies (one for $185,000 and a proposed one for $440,000) stopped David and city commissioner Jess Tetreau-Kalifa from giving away the store.
Bu the way, John  Wood is now a Brownsville Navigation District commissioner and Virginia is still his wife.
Aren't we one big happy Democratic family?