El Paso Politics

Remember last year when everyone was sitting around waiting on big names to get into the mayoral race? What happened? The big name that announced early went on to win pretty easily. There was a lot of scrambling and maneuvering behind the scenes for an opponent but ultimately Margo was the big fish and despite everyone hoping another big name would get in, the mayoral race became a blow out. The race for congress is likely going to be the same thing. I get calls, tweets, texts, and emails from all over asking what the congressional race is going to look like and my answer is pretty simple - you're already watching it. No other major candidate is getting in, Cesar Blanco has shut the door completely on a congressional run - so stop praying the rosary that he'll jump in. This race is between County Judge Veronica Escobar and EPSID School Board Trustee Dori Fenenbock. I don't foresee any other major candidate out there that is going to get in the race. Sure, there's a coup...

My bad. I should've written this post a long time ago. I'm often critical of our local leaders because, well frankly - they deserve it! But I should give credit where credit is due. For far too long in the past, our delegation that represented El Paso was known basically for infighting and making fools of themselves. But now that the main culprits are out office, its about time that we had a legislator recognized for being effective instead of being recognized for being a Bum Steer or furniture. So props to State Rep Joe Moody for making a list for being a good legislator. We already knew that, but its nice that the rest of the state is catching up. Joe Moody, this week's Homeboy of the Week. (Moody has won a couple of times so far, he's quickly becoming the Alec Baldwin of the LSB)

This political cartoon in courtesy of Steve Hern .

As I mentioned previously Commissioners Court lack of action on the jail contract has a lot of really surprising revelations about some of our community leaders that advocate for comprehensive immigration reform. Frankly a lot of it has been missed, so I am going to do a deep dive over the next few days going over what statements have been made regarding local leaders saying out of one side of their mouth that they oppose SB4 but in practice they further Trump's vision of the border rather than combat it. The fact that they have issues within their control and kick the can down the road is disappointing and shows politics and emotion are more important at times that the human being being affected by their inaction. Lets start with Sheriff Wiles' opposition to ending the jail contract with the federal government in which El Paso County incarcerates more undocumented immigrants than another other county in the state of Texas. The lion's share of which are there for charges re...

Congressional candidate and former EPISD Board President Dori Fenenbock along with EPISD Superintendent Juan Cabrera were on KVIA's ABC 7 Xtra last night. It was like watching Donald Trump on Fox and Friends. There's a lot to unpack with this so let me get right to it. First of all, having the two of them on together on KVIA of all stations is going to draw criticism and KVIA should've known that was coming. Hell, I bet it would make a great ABC 7 Listens! To the best of my knowledge, I haven't seen them cover any of the stories regarding the travel scandal at EPISD, but they decided to do an Xtra on the topic. The fact that they had little (if any at all) coverage of the scandal and still do the Xtra on the topic completely blew up their upfront non-apology for having the audacity to put Cabrera on when his brother is the main anchor of the station. The said something about some sort of editorial firewall blah blah blah but the reality is his brother is the main anchor...

I’ve said this many times before but most of you didn’t believe me, so maybe now you will. We often disagree with out friends the most fervently on issues and this is one of those occasions. As much respect and admiration as I have for County Judge Veronica Escobar and Sheriff Wiles, I completely disagree with their recent action, or should I say inaction,  at Commissioner's Court.  This is a long post, but stick with me because there is a lot I'll be revealing that I think people may have missed. And there'll be a few parts to this conversation, so walk with me... I spent the last few days thinking about the events over the past two weeks, and as much as I hate to admit it, Trump’s vision of the border is winning, and our local leaders and advocates who are supposed to be on the frontlines of the “resistance” have let Trump define who we are. And sadly, we’ve had some pretty Trumpian policies in place like the detention of undocumented immigrations before he was even a can...

County Judge Veronica Escobar has stated that she's not running for reelection. So no reason to be coy about it, people only do that when they have a reason to, and in her case we all know what that reason is - to run for congress. There's plenty of talk about who is going to run to replace her but no one has really talked about the ramifications of her impending resignation so lets lay it out there. First of all, when she resigns it will be a decision of the entire court as to who her successor will be. No matter who that person may be, they will need 3 out of 4 votes of the remaining court. So it will be very difficult for Judge Escobar to really line someone up to replace her - so David K should probably not throw around Susie Byrd as a viable option just yet. But think about what that really means to the Court. Generally they don't pick someone with aspirations to run for the office, although there is nothing that legally prohibits it. There are at least two members of ...