WASHINGTON — South Texas GOP Rep. Monica De La Cruz lost her bitterly fought bid for a third House term against Democrat Bobby Pulido — whose ties to a registered sex offender and former bandmate upended the House contest when they were exposed by The Post in April.
De La Cruz spoke at this summer’s GOP midterm convention in Dallas and was the most prominent of a series of Hispanic House Republican candidates in Texas, where her party redrew districts earlier this year in a bid to reduce Democratic seats.
Pulido, a popular Spanish-language recording artist, initially appeared to be a long-shot candidate in the freshly redrawn district, which President Trump won by 18 percentage points in 2024. But as polls showed Trump’s Hispanic support slipping over economic concerns and backlash to high-profile immigration raids, Democrats saw the 15th Congressional District seat as an unexpected pickup opportunity.
But Pulido, a two-time Latin Grammy winner, faced tough questions throughout his campaign for having performed with a registered sex offender who played accordion in his Tejano band after being sentenced to prison for indecent contact with an eight-year-old girl.
Video even resurfaced of Pulido bragging about getting the serial offender “out of jail” years before the incident.
The New Yorker, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and other outlets all cited The Post’s reporting on the bandmate in articles highlighting Pulido’s repeated appearances at quinceañeras, the Latino coming-of-age ceremony for girls who turn 15.
After De La Cruz sniped that “this election isn’t about who you want performing at your niece’s quinceañera,” Pulido turned the attack around by performing at about 80 celebrations.
“We would never have done a quinceañera,” he told Mother Jones last month. “After one day we had a thousand invites. And we’ve done almost 80 of them.”
“We’re able to get in front of a different type of working-class voter that during the week they’re too busy working, you’re never gonna see them throughout the course of the campaign,” he said. “For us to be able to get in front of them is truly a gift that she gave us.”
De La Cruz, meanwhile, pitched voters on her humble upbringing in the border city of Brownsville, recalling in her convention speech that her grandfather picked watermelons “in the hot Texas sun so that I could stand before you today.”
“Our grandparents taught us that if you work hard and love this country, America will meet you halfway,” she said, before attacking the Biden administration’s policies.
“Groceries went up 20%, rent ate the whole paycheck and the open border brought fentanyl into our schools and drug cartels into our neighborhoods,” she said, claiming Democrats would bring back “a return to open borders and higher taxes.”
But despite running to represent an area that went heavily for Trump two years ago, the redistricting forced De La Cruz to introduce herself to a largely new constituency, putting her at an unexpected advantage against Pulido.
The new 15th Congressional District is anchored in Hidalgo County and stretches from the Rio Grande Valley north through South Texas.
De La Cruz’s brother, Carlos, also was on the ballot Tuesday, running for Congress in Texas’s 35th Congressional District, which includes part of San Antonio. He also lost.
