The Mastermind and the Team Behind the Vince Perez Victory

I've written in the past about operatives and volunteers in the area and the work they do. Since most of Team Perez are people you probably have never heard of, I thought I'd do a profile of them so you get to know the people that played a key role in helping Vince Perez pull off a major political upset.

So, first things first. None of it could have happened without a gifted candidate. You can have the best team in the world, but if your candidate is sub-par, doesn't know the issues, is horrible on camera, stubborn, shoots off at the mouth, or doesn't listen to advice, then no amount of talent is going to pull out a win. I've seen that first hand.

Here's the team you've probably never heard of:

The Mastermind – Jose Landeros was the campaign manager and Perez and Landeros quickly became a strong team. In fact, for most of the campaign, it was just the two of them. Interestingly Landeros wasn't Perez's first choice for the position. Landeros tells the story of being offered the position and after he accepted he told Perez, “I don't really know how to run a campaign.” To which Perez replied, “Thats okay, I don't know what I'm doing either.”

Almost a year later, they pulled off a major win (but should keep your eye on).

There's a reason I dubbed him the Mastermind. He understood the importance of getting out the base. Their strategy was very Rovian and ultimately proved effective.

What makes Landeros' work so impressive is basically three things – his age, his lack of experience, and his intelligence. I guess you could add a healthy dose of confidence.

To understand Landeros you have to understand one simple fact. He's egg-head smart. He's a gifted researcher and a numbers whiz. The guy is a whiz with data and at one point there were so many charts, tables, and graphs on the walls that it looked like a scene from A Beautiful Mind. He used to be the Program Director at Community Scholars and so he is quite comfortable researching complex issues and accessing and analyzing information. That was a powerful tool for the Perez campaign.

It also meant he knew a lot of young, energetic, and smart people. So when it came time to rustle up some volunteers, Team Perez always had the youngest, best, and brightest in town.

Landeros himself is young.

Very young.

People forget because of his beard and the way he carries himself that the vato is only 25 years old. He has a Bachelor's Degree from Texas A & M and somehow managed to get his Master's degree, while he was campaigning for Perez. He's a freakin' prodigy and obviously people have taken note. He's already been contacted by a few candidates for other projects because they recognize his work.

The fact that he has never run a campaign before and had very limited campaign experience to begin which makes the achievement that much more notable. But his intellect combined with his ability to problem solve helped level-out the learning curve and overcome the lack of experience in things like block-walking, phone banking, and GOTV.

Now he's a pro.

Two other qualities you should know about Landeros. He's got a hell of a work ethic. Late nights were common in the campaign. Block walking when other candidates wouldn't. Covering more turf than the others could and trying things the others wouldn't. You can't teach that quality. You either have it or you don't. He purchased a new pair of boots early in the campaign. He's worn holes in them through block-walking in the valley.

And then there's his humor. He knows exactly the right moment to make light of things and that helps a lot when there are a lot of young people in the campaign. Case in point, the other night he and a couple of volunteers were in Horizon City and there were several sheriff deputies, Horizon PD, and some guys with the word SECURITY on their shirts just chillin' in front of the 7-11 behind the McDonald's. They were there for a good while just shooting the breeze. Landeros decided to have a little fun and as they drove off, he played the Bad Boys song (Theme from COPS) in his truck as loud as he could. One of the deputies started bobbing his head to the song, the rest just sort of turned around and gave a look to Landeros as they drove off laughing.

Pay attention to this guy. He's gonna be around for a long time. Get used to it. And he and Perez planned a brilliant GOTV effort that required the help of a good strong core group of motivated, dedicated, hard-working people to make it happen.

The Team. Like every good team there are role players and chemistry is important. The opposition must've hated seeing the team pull up during early voting. A collection of young, smart, good-looking, hard-working people that other people wanted to be around. They showed up at an early voting site, usually just to eat and go over their next plan of action and then boom, they disappeared. Everyone wondered what they were up to.

Its called GOTV people...and they have campaign street cred now...

The Back-Up. Claudia Ordaz first started working with Perez when they were with Congressman Reyes' Office. She helped a lot with messaging and press releases because of her background but her biggest contribution was support. She kept the team on task and redirected when they would occasionally wonder off into something less productive. She did a lot of block-walking and was really effective at communicating with voters which makes sense because communications is her field. She earned a Bachelor's from UTEP.

Another example of young, smart talent on the team. Perez ballot number in the run-off election was #33. Ordaz happens to be a big Rangers fan and there is a guy that plays on the Rangers who has the number 33 and just so happens to have the last name Perez. So she bought a t-shirt with the last name and the number and wore it on election day. That's devotion people. She was also a great cheerleader for her boyfriend and people better keep an eye on her too. A young, smart Latina with campaign experience and skilled at crafting a message...if I were a State Rep, City Rep, County Commissioner, or School Board member in her area, I'd watch my back...

The Intern. Darlene Diaz is another one of the Perez team of young guns. She used to intern for Congressman Reyes and is working on a Master's Degree at St. Mary's in San Antonio. She came back in to the campaign during the run-off and she was a tenacious block-walker and phone-banker. She's a Socorro High graduate and even recruited a member of the championship baseball team to come help out with an all-night election eve night-op. She's great with seniors and knows every back-road and dirt-road shortcut in Socorro. She once scared the hell out of her block-walk partner by spending an hour visiting with the first Mayor and former Fire Chief of Socorro during a block-walk.

The Cavalry. A couple of young guys also need to be mentioned here as well because they were the Johnny-on-the-Spot guys that showed up at the right time and gave a good final push to help out near the end during early voting and election day.

Cristian Martinez, who is a UT student was one of the block-walkers and phone-bankers. He was also a poll-sitter for a while and was great because he was very quiet and non-threatening. Thats a good quality to have when you have some overly-aggressive people shoving push cards in a voter's face.

James “Colville” Bonneau – Another academic freak of nature. He's only 22 years old and he's a law student in DC. He came home to El Paso and told Perez he had some time on his hands and he ended up jumping in with both feet and putting in some crazy hours with the campaign. He actually was greeted by a voter during the late-night night op on Election eve at around 1230am at a home in the Del Valle area. The voter complimented him on how hard the campaign was working to still be out in the middle of the night trying to hustle votes. (I know what you're thinking...he looks a little like Nicholas Cage in this pic. I think I feel another Separated at Birth piece coming along soon.)

The Kiddo...My kiddo to be exact, Sandra Abeytia. She along with a friend were given a great deal of responsibility for a not-quite 18 year old. She had to babysit Pavo Real. If you don't know, campaign workers are known for throwing a few elbows down in the valley. But she did well and made her Papa and her Tata proud. Keeping up the family name in politics...

All of these young people deserve a tip of the hat. People, including myself, tend to ignore young voters because of their general apathy and lack of participation but the people in the inner core of Team Perez are the exception and not the rule. They care about their communities enough to get some skin in the game and work hard for something they believe in. Not many people do that and it was their drive and intensity that made the phenomenal GOTV effort a reality.

And lets not forget...

Jorge Reyes, the campaign treasurer. He made sure everything was in order and even worked right up to midnight a couple times to make sure that the reports were in on time. He's also a good information guy and helped at various times throughout the campaign.

Jeff Gonzalez, a young Republican ironically, also chipped in during early voting to help out at the polls and he's currently interning in DC as well. (He might be in my next Separated at Birth piece too because he looks like Tim Duncan from the Spurs, if he were Chicano.)

And a couple of campaign vets helped out one weekend as well. Lorretta Akers and Kathy Coronado walked some turf in Socorro for the team too.

Obviously Perez's parents were very helpful to their son in his bid to win the election. His dad was his sign guy. And he engineered some pretty effective displays of signs at the polls. He also ran food out to all the volunteers during early voting. Vince's mother, like all mothers, was the glue that kept things together (and cleaned up after everyone). Every campaign should have a campaign mom. She made sure people were fed and that there were always snacks in the fridge. She has two boys, but she ended up with several more sons and a few daughters during the campaign. Great lady. The parents are pure class.

Speaking of parents, Claudia Ordaz's parents also got in on the act and phone banked. Mr. Ordaz was a poll sitter in Fabens, which requires a special kind of dedication. If you've ever had to poll sit in Fabens you know exactly how much it can suck. Mr. Ordaz volunteered to do it.

And every campaign should have a campaign madrina as well. Team Perez had Sylvia Barron who fed the troops and put up with a house full of young people that became the defacto headquarters for the campaign at times. She was probably Perez's most ardent supporter that wasn't a blood relative.

Danny Frescas was another phone-banker that helped out a lot. He was very helpful to the campaign and another strong supporter.

Jose Landeros' mom also helped quite a bit and block-walked, phone-banked, and drove volunteers and people to the polls. She frequently wore an "Aggie Mom" or other A & M shirt in support of her boy-genius. 

Angela Delora gets a special mention too. She got roped in by Landeros as well because, well, she's his girlfriend. At first she didn't want anything to do with campaigning. Her famous last words were "I'll drive you around but I don't want to have to talk to anyone." Next thing you know "Hi, my name is Angela and I'm a volunteer with the Vince Perez campaign...", she was phone banking and giving voters rides to the polls on "The Votin' Bus". She drove a guy to the polls that had never voted in his life until this run-off election and he was going to the polls to vote for Perez. She was very proud that the gentleman was her voter. She and Landeros made almost 800 phone calls on Election Day as part of the GOTV effort. She was excited when the results came in as the rest of the team. Not bad for an RN who was completely a-political until this election and said she didn't want to talk to anyone. 

Take a bow Team Perez – you guys deserve it.