Frank Corte, Jr.

Frank Julius Corte, Jr.​
Texas State Representative for District 123 (Bexar County)​
In office 1993​ – 2003​
Preceded by	Jeff Wentworth​
Succeeded by	Mike Villarreal​
Texas State Representative for District 122 (Bexar County)​
In office 2003​ – 2011​
Preceded by	John Shields​
Succeeded by	Lyle Larson​
Born	August 10, 1959​
Nationality	American​
Political party	Republican​
Spouse(s)	Valerie Ann Ryder Corte ​
Children	Three children​
Residence	San Antonio, Texas​
Alma mater	Texas A&M University​ United States Army War College
Occupation	Real estate businessman​
Religion	Southern Baptist​

Frank Julius Corte, Jr. (born August 10, 1959), is a real estate businessman in San Antonio, Texas, who served as a Republican state representative for Bexar County between 1993 and 2011.

​ Corte is the son of Frank Corte, Sr. (born 1930), and the former Rose Dean (born c. 1933) of San Antonio. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in building construction from Texas A&M University in College Station.^[1] He has been a cubmaster for the Boy Scouts. He is a Sunday school teacher and a deacon at the University Baptist Church in San Antonio.^[2]​

Corte is employed in the property-management and land-development business.^[1]​

In 1982, Corte was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps and served three years on active duty. He joined the Marine Corps Reserve and was activated in the Gulf War of 1991. After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 (known as 9-11), Corte was recalled to duty and sent to Egypt. In 2002, he graduated from the United States Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. A colonel in the United States Marine Corps, Corte served in the Iraq War for more than six months.^[3]​ Corte was awarded the Bronze Star.^[1]

While he was away twice on military deployments, he designated his wife, the former Valerie Ann Ryder (born 1967), the mother of their three children, as his stand-in for his legislative duties, a procedure allowed in Texas.​^[4] Valerie is one of four daughters of the former Mary Louise Wilson (born 1940) and Gene Ed Ryder (born 1932), a native of Canyon in Randall County, who was reared in Seymour in Baylor County, Texas,^[5] and was a training administrator for the United States Air Force until his retirement in 1995.^[6] Corte's father-in-law Gene Ryder was a member of the Texas State Republican Executive Committee from 1994 to 2000 and a George W. Bush delegate to the 2000 and 2004 Republican National Conventions^[7]

Corte's former House colleague, Carl Isett of Lubbock, also designated his wife, Cheri, as his legislative proxy in 2006, while as a commissioned officer in the United States Navy Reserve, Isett was deployed to Kuwait and Iraq.^[8]​

Corte was elected in House District 123 in 1992, when the incumbent Jeff Wentworth, a Moderate Republican, instead ran successfully for the District 25 seat in the Texas Senate, a position which Wentworth lost in 2012 to conservative Donna Campbell of New Braunfels. Corte is remembered for his unwavering attempts to limit abortion, including his update to the Women's Right to Know Act to ensure the requirement of ultrasounds before a woman in Texas can legally terminate a pregnancy.^[3]

From 1993 to 1996 and again from 1996 to 1998, Corte was the president of the legislative bipartisan Texas Conservative Coalition.^[2] He was moved from District 123 to neighboring District 122 in 2003 to succeed John Shields, who did not seek reelection to the House that year but instead unsuccessfully challenged Jeff Wentworth within the Republican primary.^[4] In the 1996 presidential election, Corte was an elector for the Dole/Kemp ticket.^[9]

Corte did not seek a tenth two-year term in the Texas House in the 2010 Republican primary and was succeeded in the legislature by former Bexar County Commissioner Lyle Larson, another Moderate Republican.^[1]

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