GOP attacks Democratic leader on vote fraud
AUSTIN — Texas Republicans want to know what Texas Democratic Party Chairman Gilberto Hinojosa knew about voter fraud in the Rio Grande Valley when he led the party there — one of the state’s Democratic strongholds.
In a statement Tuesday, Republican Party of Texas Chairman Tom Mechler said Hinojosa “needs to come clean with the people of Texas” about whether he “personally participated in the corrupt practice of using politqueras to commit voter fraud.”
“Voters deserve to know whether Chairman Hinojosa knowingly oversaw institutional voter fraud or if he simply turned a blind eye to fraudulent practices that were routinely committed by Democrat candidates in South Texas,” Mechler said.
The statement followed an NPR story that chronicled the rise and prevalence of so-called “politiqueras” that candidates, nearly all Democrats, in the Rio Grande Valley have used to corral votes and win local elections. The article cited a 2013 U.S. Department of Justice finding that more public officials were convicted for corruption in South Texas than in any other region in the country, prompting the creation of an anti-corruption task force within the FBI.
Mechler also slammed Hinojosa for his party’s focus on repealing the state’s stringent voter ID law, calling it “comical that Chairman Hinojosa runs all over the state denouncing Voter ID, when the FBI is investigating voter fraud in his backyard.”
In 2007, Hinojosa was the elected chairman of the Cameron County Democratic Party before he came to lead the state party as chairman.
The Democratic Party shot back, questioning the “political campaigns and use of politiqueras ”by Texas Secretary of State Carlos Cascos, a former Cameron County judge who Republican Gov. Greg Abbott appointed to the statewide post in Austin.
“It’s a shame that Texas Republicans only talk about the Rio Grande Valley to attack this hardworking community — a place that has been suffocated by failed Republican policies, leaving it with stagnant wages, underfunded schools, and crumbling infrastructure,” said TDP deputy executive director Manny Garcia.
They also took a jab at Attorney General Ken Paxton, whose securities fraud case will soon be presented to a grand jury.
“Finally, since Chairman Mechler has a newfound concern for the law, we call on him to join the Texas Democratic Party and demand Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton face the consequences for repeatedly violating federal and state law,” Garcia said.
“No Republican is above the law, Chairman Mechler.”