SATIRE: This is parody. Not a real news report.
EDINBURG — Democratic congressional candidate Bobby Pulido announced Monday that his campaign has officially completed its canvass of Texas’ 15th District, citing as evidence the estimated 30,000 cheeks he has personally kissed at tailgates, quinceañeras, and icehouse parking lots since launching his bid.
“People ask me about my policy platform, and I point to the cassette,” Pulido told supporters at a UTRGV tailgate, holding aloft a well-worn copy of Desvelado. “Side A is jobs. Side B is also Desvelado. Flip it when you’re ready for term two.”
The campaign confirmed that every voter contact now ends the same way: a photo, a cheek kiss, and a volunteer whispering “remember to vote” before the voter can ask about healthcare. Campaign manager Rick del Bosque defended the method. “Traditional canvassing knocks on doors. We knock on memories. A door can be locked. A memory of 1994 cannot.”
Incumbent Responds: ‘One Nice Song Does Not Equal a Water Bill’
Rep. Monica De La Cruz, campaigning between stops in Progreso, blasted Pulido as “a silver spoon with a horn section” and warned voters that electing him would reinstall the old compadre system, except now with a key change.
“My opponent believes the Valley’s problems can be solved with a nostalgia tour,” De La Cruz said. “I believe they can be solved with insurance, which is why every solution I offer is also insurance.”
Pulido countered at a Donna rally that Valley voters are not poor, just broke, and that being broke is temporary, like his opponent’s congressional district. “And if you don’t like the song, blame the songwriter,” he added. “I just sing it. At you. Outside the polling place. Legally 100 feet away.”
Election officials in Hidalgo County clarified that a cheek kiss does not technically count as a ballot unless it is notarized, but admitted they had “no protocol for a Grammy.”
Early Voting Opens; Soundtrack Already Decided
Early voting opened Oct. 19 with Desvelado playing, by unofficial ordinance, at every polling location from Edinburg to Mission. Several poll workers reported voters of both parties mouthing the words while filling out their ballots, a phenomenon political scientists are calling “the bolero bloc.”
“Honestly I came out to vote against somebody,” said one tailgater, who asked to remain anonymous because his abuelita already claimed his vote via cheek kiss in 1997. “But then the song hit the chorus and, you know. Democracy.”
