RUBEN CORTEZ: POT CALLING THE KETTLE BLACK; REMEMBER I.E.S.? OR THAT HE TRIED TO CASH IN ON A CHARTER SCHOOL?

“As a father of four, I believe no one should ever profit from the misery of children. I’ve dedicated my life in public service to protecting our students, especially the most vulnerable — including immigrant children and those with special needs. Our community knows who has been there for our families and who shares our values.” Ruben Cortez, a member of the Texas State Board of Education who is also running for Texas House District 37

Special to El Rrun-Rrun

With early voting ending today and election day in the Democratic primary next Tuesday, March 1, Ruben Cortez, who is running against Luis Villarreal for Texas House District 37, is pulling out all the stops to smear his opponent.

Obviously, Cortez's mama (JP 2-1 Linda Salazar) never taught him that people in glass houses should not throw stones.

Cortez thinks that his ace-in-the -hole is the disclosure he has been peddling across the district that Villarreal was once chief operating officer at SOG International for one year – between 2019 and 2020 – that partnered with Sunny Glen, a shelter for migrant children with a troubled history in Texas before he was onboard.

What he is leaving unsaid is that he was hired as a grant writer by Ruben Gallegos Sr. and Ruben Gallegos Jr. for International Educational Services (IES), a shelter for migrant minors  that was shut down by the federal government after it was revealed - among other things - that the Gallegos had been paying themselves between $600,000 to and $700,000 in violation of federal guidelines.

And he won't say that he was getting around 70,000 as a "grant writer," although there is no mention of what grants he wrote or whether they were successful. 

Not profiting from the misery of children? Did he refuse the cash or return it once he found out? Hardly.

Ironically, among those on the board working with Cortez was none other than Eduardo Andres Lucio (Rep. Eddie Lucio III) listed as receiving $125,000 a year as I.E.S. legal counsel.

Cortez even got the AFT teacher's union to issue a scathing assessment of the charter schools and migrant centers in Texas and they issued a statement saying: 

“Anyone associated...with the troubling work of building and running a child prison camp should be disqualified from running for office..."

And what was IES for whom Cortez worked and received his inflated salary if not that? 

And if the AFT had done their due diligence they would discover that Cortez was actively pursuing the establishment of a charter school in Brownsville which would have been in competition for state funding with public schools.

People from Brownsville remember when Cortez was trying to raise seed money to establish one here, going as far as to contact Ray Montanero – among others – to invest in the scheme that would leave a nice pile of cash from public-school funding in his bulging pockets.

"Everyone remembers thinking, why is Cortez pushing for a charter school when he's a member of the Texas State Board of Education and trying to fund a charter school in competition with the public schools when he was a BISD  school board member where his wife is a principal commanding a  $100,000 salary from the public schools,?" recalled a  former county administrator.

"Criticizing his opponent Luis Villarreal for having worked for one year while he was receiving his $70,000 from I.E.S. is the height of hypocrisy, a hypocrisy that has characterized all of Ruben's public life," he added.