There are two big stories here. One, the unexpectedly strong showing that Sara Stapleton made in Cameron County against incumbent District 27 Senator Eddie Lucio Jr. Despite the showing, many people tend to forget that you can't put your eggs in one basket, as the challenger apparently did in Cameron.
At first blush, Cameron County's 214,871 registered voter pool looks like it could be the deciding factor in the race, but next door in Hidalgo, there are 382,477 potential votes. Lucio won there by 1,152 votes, a number that dwarfed the 221 majority he beat Stapleton with in Cameron.
We smell the hand and voter analysis skills of Rodrigo Moreno's Pink Ape ad agency who probably realized that Stapleton might not be able to spread her campaign to cover that far afield. Without Moreno's strategy, the result might have been embarrassing. Willacy County also came out relatively strong for Lucio, with the incumbent getting 932 more votes that provided a cushion against her strong Cameron showing. Covering those outside bases provided Lucio enough votes to overcome his dwindling popularity at home.
Nonetheless, with a Republican challenger who is on trial for possession of marijuana in November, Lucio should consider himself lucky to have won this election. Realistically, his stock is going down in his district, especially in his hometown. The sheen is wearing thin, Eddie. Would Sara have beaten Eddie III?
The other race of note is the undisputed victory of former Cameron County District Clerk Eric Garza over incumbent Cameron County Sheriff Omar Lucio. The pundits didn't give Garza much of a chance at winning and ruthlessly rode his candidacy with ridicule calling him a boy in fight with a man, a "pencil pusher," etc., But Garza and his minions were unrelenting and focused on the obvious shortcomings of not only Lucio, an 84-year-old man, but of his trusted cadre in his administration which had led him far astray of his role as a professional lawman.
It might be the classic case of the king placing too much trust on the his advisors to do the right things. But Garza was adept at focusing on those shortcomings in the administration of the department and highlighting them in his television and social media appeals.Did complacency kill the king?
Helen Delgadillo knew she had a hard row to how against Gaby Garcia in the 138th District Court race and she made the best of it, but came up short. Delgadillo, a hard-nosed defense attorney not many lawyers in the county relish confronting in court hails from her Port Isabel home base and drew a substantial number of votes there, but a one-person campaign could not make up the difference of the primary results. Nonetheless, her 8,777 votes are nothing to sneeze at and indicate that she might have a better-than-average shot at a future judgeship.
In the Pct. Constable race it was basically a grudge match in a small pit-bull pen between Eddie Solis and Fred Peña. These are the kinds of small localized elections that are never forgotten by either the victor or the loser and rematches are always a possibility if the winds of fate change as they tend to do so often in those places.
It's been a long haul since the March 3 election to the runoff in July 14. Our gratitude and admiration for offering your candidacy to represent us ton all the candidates. You have shown us that the democratic process lives despite our present troubles and tribulations. Thank you all.