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Renard Johnson, the Oligarchy candidate for Mayor whose brother and former business partner was indicted for a $3 million Ponzi scheme, appointed the daughter of County Judge Ricardo Samaniego as his Campaign Treasurer on January 18.
That was the first red flag.
Then only 12 days later, the Judge attended Johnson’s campaign launch and told El Paso Inc that the candidate has “got the right traits” to be Mayor but stopped short of endorsing him–that is, until this month.
On July 12, the Renard Johnson campaign, presumably under the direction of Laura Zimmerman (Escobar’s Campaign Manager), published a video on Instagram of Judge Samaniego announcing his endorsement in the most servile manner imaginable.
Among his statements is this: “I have a front seat at knowing what the City needs and what the County needs, and it’s that synergism between the two that really gives us a tremendous amount of strength. We have great challenges coming up, some great opportunities, and I can guarantee you that relationship between a Mayor and a County Judge really makes things move forward.”
In other words, Samaniego dislikes Oscar Leeser and Brian Kennedy, who have successfully led the effort to restrain the City’s spending, stop debt issuances, prevent tax increases, and uproot corruption; and he wants a partner in the City who will agree to his tax-and-spend agenda.
And precisely what does Samaniego mean by “moving forward?”
Well let’s see. He voted to raise his own salary to $152,700, supported the $34 million County tax increase, and now apparently backs the issuance of $482 million of bond debt (including $188 million in certificates of obligation), more than tripling the County’s debt service. We also expect him to back the $396.6 million UMC debt issuance, increasing the total debt service of the County and UMC to more than $1.6 billion.
We have watched with dismay as the Judge strayed into the Oligarchy camp and embraced most of their tax-and-spend agenda.
His endorsement of Johnson, who is the candidate of Dee and Adair Margo and the big developers, is very disappointing to folks like us, who had supported him when he first ran for office.
We are betrayed.
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