El Paso Politics

A few different blog items that I am just throwing in to one post. In probably the most egregious example of a candidates side-stepping campaign laws I have ever seen, current Justice of the Peace for Precinct 4 (the Eastside) Jesus Urenda put a campaign sign for his reelection on a Constable's vehicle and had them drive him in the Sun Bowl Parade. Here is a pic of the signs (they were on multiple vehicles) affixed to constable patrol vehicles. Judge Urenda is in the far vehicle waving to the crowd. Here's a closer look at the signs. As you can see, all he did was tape some blue painter's masking tape to the parts of his sign that said "re-elect" and cover up the disclaimers at the bottom. It is against campaign laws to use public property like a law enforcement vehicle for campaign purposes. Covering up a couple of parts of your campaign sign doesn't alleviate him of the problems. I'm sure someone will likely file an ethics complaint over this little stun...

When I heard it, I thought it was another bad Johnson Jewlers commercial. Something along the lines of the mayor is a blue jumper with his name on a patch on his chest with a wrench in his hand. Queue the close up. "I don't wanna be your plumber!" But no, instead of a bad Johnson's Jewlers commercial, it was Mayor Cook being interviewed on the road by a KTSM reporter. Click here to see the entire story and hear the Mayor in his own words. "Did they want me to restore their water? I'm not a plumber," Mayor Cook said in a phone interview today. Mayor Cook was apparently on VACATION while his constituents were dealing with the weather issues. I know the Mayor has a life, I get it. I know that the Mayor had no control over what is going on with the weather. But surely someone close to the Mayor could've told him that the remark was ignorant and completely insensitive to his consitituents who are still without water. What makes it worse, is that he soun...