$25,000 Is Cheap for a Brownsville City Commissioner Who Will Support Mayor Tony's Agenda, But the Law is the Law

Debbie Portillo

A salesman doesn't consider the money spent to make a sale resulting in a commission as a bribe.  It's simply rationalized as "spending money to make money."  So, gift cards for nights at the Holiday Inn, dinner for two at a swanky restaurant, a gift card for a spa are all tossed in with the sale to the operative with purchase order access.

Tony Martinez has strategically used financial backing to candidates for City Commissioner as a justifiable means  for his end game.   His financial and managerial support for City Commissioner Rose Gowen in 2009 has paid obvious dividends with the reportedly non-practicing gynecologist

Rose Gowen, Tony Martinez

faithfully rubber stamping Martinez at every opportunity.

Tony's partial financial support for Estela Chavez-Vasquez in 2011 fits into the same category, paying handsome dividends.  John Villarreal came more cheaply, perhaps with just a little old-fashioned bullying, but still he has toed the proverbial Martinez line like a good foot soldier.

2013 finds Tony's support in flux with Melissa Zamora seeking greener pastures and two of the mayor's lackeys having their jobs up for grabs.  All this uncertainty calls for Tony and his supporters to add a little green to the game which brings us to young Debbie Portillo.

This blog was alerted many months ago that Portillo was being groomed, given a cush office on the Cueto grounds along with a super easy job for the fake organization United Brownsville.  What Debbie was not prepared for when she finally announced her pursuit of the District 3 job was the scrutiny and scorn associated with that announcement.  Being a Tony Martinez plant is not every girl's dream job, but that's how the local bloggers quickly identified Little Debbie.  Almost as soon as Deb announced, she dropped out again.

Behind the scenes, Ms. Portillo later used what we sexists used to call a "woman's prerogative."  Before the filing deadline, she changed her mind and went for it.  The requisite campaign finance report due  on April 11, 30 days before the election showed that her campaign had received a $25,000 impetus, far exceeding the collection of any other candidate.  An anonymous commenter to one of the local blogs noticed that several of the contributors were corporations, an apparent violation of election law.

A few days later blogger Juan Montoya of El Rrun Rrun shared some disturbing news for the Portillo camp:

Claiming that Deborah Portillo, one of the four candidates in the City of Brownsville District 3 election, committed a third-degree felony by knowingly accepting contributions from one or more corporations in violation of the Texas Election Code, a complaint was filed Thursday with the Brownsville Police Department.
Candidate Martin Sarkis said he had filed the complaint against Portillo because her expense campaign report covering the period from March 1 through April 31 – 30 days before the election – Portillo filed with the City of Brownsville Secretary indicated that she had received money from several suspect corporate contributors

One reader of Juan's blog gave this comment:

She is not even elected and she is alredy breaking the law. This is happens because she was pushed to run and was given money so that she could run. You could tell by the contributors that she was bought. This proves what you have been posting all along Juan. That she is the 4th vote against the citizens of Brownsville and towards Tony Martinez and his elite friends. They think the citizens of Brownsville are stupid and don't know what is good for them. If she wins Deborah,Tony, Gowen and Chavez will destroy the city and leave the city bank rupt. John Villareal is another puppet of Tony Martinez and United Brownsville. There is so much more I would like to say but I need to work and pay for the tax increase of PUB and the City.

A Portillo supporter suggested a quick solution and chastised Sarkis for filing the criminal complaint:

One quality is that she is HONEST. Her campaign manager should had spotted the problem and dealt with it by returning the funds. To remedy the situation, return the money. This occurred with Yolanda De Leon campaign many years ago. I am only disappointed that Mr. Martin S. had to go out of the way to file criminal charges against her. Sounds familiar to Hernandez tactics of which he denies he is aligned with that group.

While many Brownsvillians are oblivious to this election and UTB's Project 100% Vote can't seem to motivate students to participate, this election season has not been without drama.  The police and fire marshal have been called to a pachanga site. Police cruised by the Brownsville Central library to tell signholders to pipe down.  A politiquera has been indicted for an election law violation and now, a felony election law violation has been filed against a candidate.