What escaped my notice until now was the wording on the red neckband holding the two plasticized, laminated I.D. cards: "VOTE ERNIE 2010". I cropped the original picture and enlarged it just enough to make that readable. Of course, this should not be a surprise to those who have followed the escapades and statements of Mr. Hernandez. In 2003 he told the Brownsville Herald: "There is nothing illegal about paying people to solicit votes." As for Ms. Becerra, she was one of a select few wearing the official badge of the Erin H. Garcia campaign at the meet and greet. It should be noted that she also wears the I.D. tag for the "Honorable" Linda Salazar, currently Justice of the Peace, District 2-1.
Brownsville voters will have to decide if they want to continue to support candidates who use politiqueras. It helps to understand how politiqueras operate, how their influence taints an election. A two-time candidate for city office enlightened me: "They have friends throughout the city that they have used for many years. The politiquera performs simple acts of kindness, like bringing some sweet bread or making a social call from time to time. At election time the "friends" know what's expected and vote as directed. The politiquera knows roughly how much the votes are worth. They will not deliver more votes than they get paid for."
Local businessman Dino X. Chavez understands the problem, but states: " Jim, I am 110% against the use of politiqueras to illegally collect votes for a candidate! However, just to play the devil's advocate, what should an honest candidate do to have a chance in a close race when going against a candidate who c...hooses to use politiqueras to harvest votes?
Should they do like John Villarreal did and just hope for the best? Should they use their funds to hire private investigators to follow the opposition, or the opposition's contracted politiqueras? Should they file a complaint with the Texas Ethics Commission? Should they file a suit alleging wrongdoing?
Candidates have been on the losing end of close races for decades because of the use of politiqueras! All of the above as been tried and been proven futile."
Mr. Chavez is right. Dishonesty has frequently been rewarded in our community. In the 2003 mayoral election during which Ernie Hernandez gave the quote above, there were three candidates. Henry Gonzalez and Hernandez openly used politiqueras. Robert Uresti did not, stating his opposition to the practice. Uresti finished third. Curiously though, the last runoff city commission election bucked this trend. If a disproportionate amount of mail-in votes indicate the use of politiqueras, winners John Villarreal and Estela Chavez prevailed despite not using them.
One thing the election office can do was mentioned by Kimberly Dale: "What the election office should do is have a signature expert match the signatures of the mail in votes." This sounds like a great idea, but Election Administrator Roger Ortiz has great difficulty simply counting the votes, let alone matching signatures on mail-ins.
Let's state the obvious: If a candidate uses nefarious means to get elected, will they serve us honestly?
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