And Now, Another Storytime with Lucila Najera

If you’ve been keeping up with Lucila Najera over the last few months, you know the campaign has turned into less of a race and more of a… let’s call it a creative writing workshop.

Because at this point, we’re not just dealing with spin. We’re dealing with numbers that seem to come from fairy tales, fever dreams, or possibly a broken calculator from 1997.

Let’s take a quick stroll down memory lane, shall we? Because she's told so many fairy tales I lost track. 

Just kidding, here is a list:

There was the now-famous “cash-only weddings” situation. First, she said she made about $4,000. Maybe $5,000. You know, just a casual “I’ll ballpark my own income” moment. Then, a few days later, boom, we’re at $10,000.

And look, inflation is bad, but it’s not that bad.

Now, a reasonable person might think, “Hey, shouldn’t someone know how much money they’re making, especially if they’re, I don’t know… reporting it to the IRS?” But that’s where things get interesting. Because when everything is cash-only, suddenly the math gets real foggy, real fast. It’s like trying to count tortillas at a family cookout. You know there were more, but somehow nobody saw anything.

Then we had the truancy story.

According to her, there was a student with over 300 absences.

Three. Hundred.

From a school year that has, what, around 180 days? Maybe 185 if the district is feeling ambitious.

So unless this kid was skipping school on weekends, holidays, and somehow looping back into a second academic dimension, that number doesn’t just stretch the truth, it straight up pulls a hamstring.

And just when you thought we were done, she took a swing at math again.

She told students that every missed day of school costs taxpayers about $500,000.

Half a million. Per day. Per kid.

At that rate, one middle schooler missing a week would collapse the entire state budget. We’d have to start selling the Alamo just to keep the lights on. 

In reality, it’s closer to about $40 per day.

Forty.

As in, less than what you spend at the Dollar Store when you “just go in for one thing.”

(SIDEBAR: Honestly, I'm not against selling the entire city of San Antonio. I hate the spurs, San Antonio  is the Disneyland of Latino culture, and that abomination known as Tex - Mex food should be deported. Actually if ICE is going to target anything Latino for immediate removal from the country, it should be Tex Mex food. 

But hands off Tejano music.) 

And let’s not even get started on the campaign trail promises where she’s out here telling voters she’s going to fix streets and install traffic signs. Which is impressive, because last I checked, Justice of the Peace courts don’t come with a side of public works.

Now, normally, after a greatest hits collection like this, you’d expect things to maybe… calm down. Recalibrate. Maybe stick a little closer to reality.

But no.

Because I recently got my hands on her latest runoff campaign materials, and guess what?

We got a new claim.

This time, it’s about clearing the backlog of cases in her court.

And look, I love a good comeback story. Everybody does. But when the numbers start sounding a little too clean, a little too polished, you’ve got to ask yourself: are we finally getting facts… or are we just getting a remix?

Like Tex Mex data. 

So I did what any reasonable vato would do.

I went and pulled the data.

Not educated guesses. Not “give or take a few thousand.” Not numbers doing gymnastics - actual court records. Hard copies. The kind of receipts that don’t suddenly double a few days later.

I spent a good amount of time digging through it, breaking it down, double-checking everything, because here’s the thing:

When you’re running for a judicial seat, this isn’t just campaign chatter.

This is about credibility.

And credibility isn’t something you can just round up to the nearest ten thousand.

I’ll be posting the full breakdown Monday morning. Charts, graphs, source documents, all of it. Clean, clear, and backed up.

Because when it comes to the courts, the numbers aren’t supposed to be flexible.

And the truth definitely isn’t supposed to be optional.