PLEASE REMEMBER TO VOTE: IF NOT, WE'LL DO IT FOR YOU

By Juan Montoya
She is in her 80s.
For the past five years, she has lapsed in an out of remembrance of things she did 15 minutes ago.
Sometimes she can't remember her own relatives. At times, she can't even remember who she is or where she is at.
Her relatives say she is having trouble with El Viejo Aleman (Alzheimner's Disease).
And yet, she is one of the persons who is recorded as having voted by mail-in ballot in the July 31 runoff, an incredible feat for one who doesn't even remember who she is at times.

"A group of ladies wearing Erin Hernandez Garcia T-shirts came by and had her fill in the application to vote by mail," said a close relative. "They kept calling her to see if she had received it and when it got here, they came over and had her sign it. I just asked her if she remembers voting and she says she can't remember doing it."

Her case is but one of scores of cases uncovered during a cursory review of the mail-in ballots from precincts primarily located in the poorest of Brownsville barrios. Predictably, they are from Southmost, Las Prietas and Cameron Park barrios where the most blatant abuse of the mentally-impaired, the eldery, the illiterate and ill voters such as the woman above was perpetrated by politiqueras and politiqueros associated with the Hernandez campaign.

"That's one of the reasons I gave up on the system and don't vote," a neighbor of the woman in question told visitors to her home recently. "That lady doesn't even remember voting. My vote would have neant nothing."

The search for 153 illegal votes continues in the Yolanda Begum campaign in the JP 2-2 runoff race between her and Erin Hernandez. Hernandez was declared the winner by 152 votes. But even before the walok-in early vote and the election day totals were counted, she was already behind by 177 votes after the amil-in votes were counted.

Besides the glaring illegality of people who can't even read signing over their ballots to the politiqueras for them to fill out and mail on their behalf, a number of other discrepancies such as listing some voters as having a "disability" where none exists, signing fake names as having mailed the ballot on behalf of some voters, and not properly filling out the ballot forms and envelopes as stated in the directions.

"Some of these votes should have been disqualified on sight by Elections Department Administrator Roger Ortiz and his employees," said a seasoned elections watcher.

"Instead, they allowed this ballots to be counted. When you combine the totals of the mail-in and the early walk-in vote where they basically kidnapped the elderly from day cares and voted for them in closed vans, the only conclusion you can come to is that elections officials acted in concert with these candidate and their politiqueras to steal the election. That's not only immoral and indefensible, it probably was criminal, too."