Santa Ana Councilwoman Michele Martinez, told NBC News this week that she “will not mind if she isn’t reelected in November.” She was interviewed after this week’s City Council meeting had to be canceled after a punk in a “F*ck the police” hat wouldn’t leave.
“As I sat here and listened to all the comments, it’s really disheartening. People want to come here and threaten us,” said Martinez. “At the end of the day let me tell you I can go to sleep at night, so I don’t care if you feel that I have not done a job that you’ve asked me to do.”
The sad reality for Martinez is that she has been pandering to the FTP crowd for some time – but as she saw on Tuesday night they are insatiable. They are anarchists and nothing she or any other politician does is going to mollify them.
For Martinez to be talking like this less than a month away from the General Election is simply astounding. But when you look back at her electoral record one thing is clear. She has been very lucky in the past – and her luck could be at an end.
Martinez got into politics when she worked for developer Mike Harrah back in 2005. Harrah wanted to build the tallest office tower in Orange County, right in Downtown Santa Ana. But to do this he would have to convince the voters of Santa Ana, to vote for a referendum, Measure A. Harrah raised nearly $370,000 to support Measure A, and Martinez helped him to run the successful campaign.
The Luddites who opposed Measure A did so on the grounds that it was being built in a “historical corridor.” Those opponents all lined up the very next year behind one of their own, Evangeline Gawronski, as she ran for the City Council’s Ward 2. Martinez jumped into that race and no one thought she had a chance.
Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido did not support Martinez but he also did not ally with Gawronski. Instead Pulido got behind a City Commissioner named Fortino Rivera. When the election came along the unthinkable happened. Martinez somehow won, by a paltry 740 votes.
Martinez tried to reach out to the Gawronski supporters – the very same people who opposed Measure A. It didn’t work and in 2008 she made the seemingly crazed decision to run against Mayor Pulido. He ended up with 55% of the vote and she only got just over 16,000 votes.
Why did Martinez run for Mayor in 2008? A friend of mine heard gang banger defense lawyer Alfredo Amezcua say that she was his trial balloon. Amezcua had groomed Martinez for years – and some even alleged that they were lovers. She took one for the team in 2008.
You would think that Pulido would have found someone to run against Martinez in 2010, when her Ward 2 seat came up for reelection. But she ended up helping Pulido, who was challenged by an emboldened Amezcua. And Martinez cruised to reelection without facing an opponent.
Amezcua spent a small fortune on his Mayoral campaign in 2010. At his side were the rabble who had opposed Measure A. They assumed the victory was theirs but when the smoke cleared, Amezcua was utterly trounced by Pulido, who beat him by 10,000 votes.
Two years later, in 2012, Martinez, in the midst of a safe Council term, ran for the 69th Assembly District. Pulido appeared at several of her campaign events and she raised and spent a quarter million dollars. But carpetbagging labor organizer Julio Perez jumped into the race as did Amezcua supporter Francisco Barragan. Martinez was humiliated in the end, coming in almost last place. Perez might have won that primary election but the few votes Barragan netted, about 600 votes, were the difference that handed the victory to former Anaheim Mayor Tom Daly. He went on to beat an unknown Republican candidate in the General Election.
Martinez joined forces with her colleagues David Benavides, Sal Tinajero, and Vince Sarmiento in a much ballyhooed “Santa Ana Spring” during the 2012 General Election. They successfully passed a Mayoral term limit measure which limited Pulido to three two-year terms – although the Council gets to serve three four-year terms.
Now, two years later, Martinez is facing a serious challenger, Mirna Velasquez, who has been endorsed by the Santa Ana Police Officers Association and the OC Labor Federation. Two other candidates are also in the race – a salsa dancer named Rene Gomez, who was recruited by the Republicans Party, and liberal LA Jewish web designer Gilad Salmon. These men stand no chance of winning but will take a few votes.
We are a few weeks away from the General Election and Martinez and her colleagues are having trouble raising money. She has no following to speak of. Even her right hand man, Alex Flores, has peeled off and is running the campaign of Alex Padilla, a paralegal who is challenging Benavides in Ward 4.
Martinez can’t possibly be enjoying any of this. She probably just wants it all to end. That will happen soon enough…
WOULD You please make up your mind editor?
Are people supposed to kiss Mike Harrah’s a$$ or not?
You blamed her for being his tool, and then you suggested that we all should have been a Measure A tool for Harrah’s bull $hit
Corporate Tower of Wall Street Babel for Christ.
What is your problem? To kiss a$$ or not to kiss a$$?????
And as for Martinez, she is not interested in working for ward 2 unless you pay her and her campaign to save her employment.
Give her a fat check and she might just give a $hit.
That’s about right. You can say the same for Reyna and Benavides.
It’s really a non sequitur. The tower was approved and it will one day be built. I do hope they’ll change it to mixed use so they can add executive condos to the office mix. And an observatory on top of the tower would be pretty cool.
Umm? It was approved how many years ago? 8?
Wall Street has been tanking for a month so maybe we will have to ask this question again when they rebound and can afford to brainwash people into worshipping blood sucking corporate America again.
Harrah always gets his way…
Oh is that so??
Does he send special gifts and home improvements to your house as well? How about vacation time in Hawaii time shares?
LOL. I’m just a blogger. I don’t talk to that guy. But he just paid 27 million for the OC Register’s HQ. And he’s bidding on their land next. He’s pretty loaded. Much too big a fish for you to fry.
Yes, Because its all for Jesus. Ever last Fing Wall Street Dollar. All for the glory of Jesus.
Anarchist’s has nothing to do withthat , stop giving anarchy a bad name
That’s what these punks are.
No they are not and they are far from bean punks more like attention whore. Punks and anarchist have more class.
We can agree that they are malcreados.
Wait we are referring to the council board members right?
No the ill-mannered young people in FTP garb.
Oh I thought we were speaking of the city council, we you know those I’ll mannered have every right to be I’ll mannered, if the police have the right to be I’ll mannered in were we work live and play then we should have the right to be I’ll mannered in which they work live and play, they work for us they knew what they were signing up for. We don’t work for them. We are there employers
These meetings belong to the people of our city. Disrupting them is an affront to all of us. And the problem in our city is the gangs not the cops.
Everyone one seemed to be in a mutual agreement that the cops is the biggest gang
I’m sure the Reyna gang banger camp would agree with that notion. But it’s the gangs that are killing people in our city.
Interesting, she told me the same thing about 2 weeks ago with a recommendation of a replacement.
I got the impression of a possible dropping out, but I did not ask that question.
She should endorse Mirna.
I support Michele Martinez for re election. Simply because we disagree on a candidate does not mean I am not supportive of her candidacy. She continues to be my friend, and mentor; I am confident she will win on November 4th.
You might want to advise her to not tell the media that she is okay with losing.
Don’t forget when “AL” got caught on a hot mic (at the Lomeli Holloween bash) calling Michele a “HOT HOLE”. Bad enough in and of itself but the giggling and response by a the hostess giggling saying “we got to do what we gat to do”
Michele, should look for a sales job for somebody trying to sell GANG intervention tools to municipalities.
LOL! Gross!
Typical Alex Flores, such a PENDEJO and Michele’s boy toy. Hahahaha!
The trouble with groups like the “Santa Ana Spring” is when you have five people equally upward mobile and willing to do anything to advance, somebody’s gonna lose.
Sounds like Michele should start thinking about starting a family…….the clocks a tickin’