Word: bonilla
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...Texas redistricting engineered three years ago by former Republican leader Tom DeLay has claimed another victim - a Republican in heavily Hispanic south Texas. In an unexpected coda to the G.O.P.'s midterm election debacle, seven-term Republican Congressman Henry Bonilla was defeated in a special runoff on Tuesday by former Democratic Congressman Ciro Rodriguez. The upset has Democrats dreaming of a fresh start in Texas, a state that has provided an almost unrelenting chain of bad news for the party in recent years...
...After just barely missing an outright election victory in the Nov. 7 election, Bonilla lost the runoff thanks to an energized Democratic base, a million-dollar campaign infusion from the Democratic Party and a call to arms by President Clinton, who came to San Antonio to campaign for Rodriguez. The victory underlined the popularity of both Bill and Hillary Clinton in the Lone Star State, and could even enhance Hillary's prospects in the 2008 presidential race. "Bill and Hilary are both popular in South Texas - that's a given," said former Democratic Party staffer and political analyst Andy Hernandez...
...Clinton came into San Antonio for a last-minute rally after internal polls showed Rodriguez was closing fast. "It all happened so quickly, we started to smell it," Hernandez said. Bonilla had 48.6% of the vote in the Nov. 7 election, which pitted the incumbent against six Democrats and an independent. Rodriguez was second with just 20%. Yet Rodriguez beat Bonilla by 10% in Tuesday's runoff. "I was stunned by the margin of defeat," said Royal Masset, a longtime Republican consultant and analyst, "A lot of us thought there was no way Henry could lose...
...Bonilla's defeat was made more likely after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June that tossed out a district drawn under the influence of former Republican leader Tom DeLay that was favorable to the Republicans. A three-judge federal panel redrew Bonilla's district and, while it still leaned Republican, it added a swath of the south side of San Antonio, a heavily Democratic area. The panel called for a special election to fill the seat on Nov. 7, Election Day, but Texas election law stipulates if no candidate wins more than 50% of the vote in a special...
...again this year in the March primary and used a picture of President Bush hugging Cuellar to try to turn the vote his way, but he lost again. Early in this latest campaign, he waffled about staying in the race and was viewed as a long shot to defeat Bonilla, a powerful member of the House Appropriations Committee with a $1.6 million campaign war chest...