Difference between revisions of "Alma Arredondo-Lynch"

Revision as of 23:59, July 21, 2019

Alma Gloria Arrendo-Lynch (Dentist and rancher in Uvalde County, Texas)
Born	December 14, 1954 Starr County, Texas Resident of Concan in Uvalde County, Texas
Political Party	Unsuccessful Republican candidate for Texas' 23rd congressional district in the March 6, 2018 primary election against incumbent Will Hurd
Spouse	Widow of Ernest Daniel Lynch (1945-2008) Son: Ernest Christian Lynch
Religion	Christian

Alma Gloria Arredondo-Lynch (born December 14, 1954),^[1] is a rancher in Concan and a dentist who practices in Uvalde, Texas. She ran unsuccessfully as a constitutional conservative Republican for Texas' 23rd congressional district in the primary election held on March 6, 2018.

She was handily defeated by the Moderate Republican and two-term incumbent Will Hurd, an African American who supports continued funding for the abortion provider Planned Parenthood, amnesty for illegal aliens, and is a vigorous opponent of building the border wall proposed by U.S. President Donald Trump. Hurd has been allied with former Texas House Speaker Joe Straus, another Moderate Republican, and the unsuccessful Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Beto O'Rourke.

In her energetic but underfunded campaign, Arrendo-Lynch questioned why Hurd was the "only 'Republican from the State of Texas to vote in favor of Obama’s transgender bill, forcing employers to allow these transgenders to use the women’s bathrooms. It had never been a problem before. I grew up using transgender bathrooms; they were called outhouses."^[2] Arredondo in her early years was a migrant farm laborer who work mainly in California. She claimed that illegal aliens working for starvation wages put her family out of the crop-gathering business.^[3]

In her criticism of Hurd for his attention to illegal aliens, Arrendo-Lynch said:

Fellow Americans, don't fret if we have to pay for the [border] wall. We spend $135 billion of taxpayers dollars on 12.4 million illegals ... The wall is $20 billion. We can build 6.5 walls. We can settle for one wall, spend the rest to increase boots on the ground and technology [in those locations in which] we can't put a physical wall. And the best part, those Mexican illegals here that financially drain our communities of $26 billion and send it Mexico, will dry up. Thus, Mexico will wind up paying for the wall indirectly. The rest of the money, use it on our veterans Americans for a change. You will never hear Will Hurd espouse such ideas. HE PUTS DACAS AND DREAMERS FIRST!^[3]

Arredondo-Lynch, originally from liberal Starr County in south Texas, was formerly a civilian dentist for the United States Navy. She resides twenty-four miles to the north of Uvalde in rural Concan, also in Uvalde County, She lives near the popular John Nance Garner State Park on her Rancho Canon Perdido, at which she tends to her own livestock and crops. In August 2017, she announced her congressional candidacy with an appearance at The Alamo in San Antonio, a monument which she regards as a beacon of Texas liberty. She opposes efforts led by Land Commissioner George P. Bush to refurbish the structure in ways that Bush critics claim would undermine its historical integrity. In many of her campaign appearances, she appears in a wide-rimmed white hat and reminds potential supporters that "I am Texas." Unlike Hurd, she is a strong Trump supporter.^[4]

Arredondo-Lynch is the widow of Ernest Daniel Lynch (1945-2008),^[5] a United States Army veteran, a former White House police officer, Secret Service firearms instructor and sharpshooter, and a U.S. Customs Patrol supervisor. The couple formerly resided in Mount Vernon, Washington, and Bryan, Texas.^[6] Prior to his death, they also resided in several locations near the Mexican border.^[3]

Arredondo-Lynch was endorsed in the race against Hurd by the San Antonio Family Association and the Pastors PAC.

The 23rd district encompasses a wide swath of mostly rural counties from western San Antonio to easterm El Paso. Hurd twice defeated the liberal Democrat Pete J. Gallego of Alpine, Texas, who held the seat from 2013 to 2015. Hurd polled 24,843 votes (81.2 percent) in the March 6 primary to Arredondo-Lynch's 11,997 (19.7 percent).^[7] Arredondo-Lynch ran only slightly better than William "Hart" Peterson, Hurd's 2016 intra-party opponent, who drew 17.79 percent of the ballots cast that year.

On March 10, 2018, Arredondo-Lynch wrote on her Facebook page that she would not support Hurd in the November 6 general election, in which Hurd defeated by 1,150 votes the Democratic liberal Gina Ortiz Jones, a former intelligence officer with the United States Air Force. Arredondo-Lynch said that she considers Hurd to be an actual Democrat because the lawmaker has voted with Republicans only 25 percent of the time in Congress, and when he did back the GOP position, it was usually on less significant matters. Arredondo-Lynch said that it would be a betrayal of her constitutional principles to support Hurd.

On June 21, 2018, Arredondo-Lynch confirmed that she will again seek the Republican nomination in House District 23 in 2020, presumably against Hurd. Meanwhile, she endorsed Pete Flores, a Republican who won the July 31 special election to choose a successor to the resigned state Senator Carlos Uresti, who left office after criminal convictions. Flores turned back a determined challenge from the liberal Democrat Pete Gallego, formerly of Alpine in Brewster County and Hurd's predecessor in the District 23 U.S. House seat.

On July 4, 2019, Arredondo-Lynch sustained a head injury in Washington, D.C., while she was riding her horse in a parade with the group, Cowboys for Trump. She sought treatment in an emergency room and was briefly admitted to a hospital. The head injury required about fifteen titanium metal sutures. After fallung she has no memory of the accident.^[8]

References