Mayoral Candidate Upset Over Ballot Number Confusion

EL PASO, Texas — El Paso’s mayoral election is just over a month away, but the confusion over a ballot with six different candidates has already begun.

Forgive Mayor John Cook is he’s so happy he sings, but it seems that everything this campaign season is going his way.

Meet Gus Haddad, the man many believe is Cook’s biggest challenger, that is, as long as he can keep the numbers straight.

“We were called down to Council chambers to draw lots, for what I thought was our ballot position … I drew number seven,” Haddad said.

Assuming he would be number 7 on the ballot, Hadded printed campaign information with “Punch number 7” on it.

“Every time there is a ballot drawing, what we do here is we give them a touch position number and that’s very different from the ballot drawing,” said County Elections Administrator Javier Chacon. Chacon explained the ballot always starts at 5 and counts up from there, making Haddad number 10.

So who is ballot number 7? Mayor Cook.

“I really appreciate the fact I have Mr. Haddad’s endorsement now,” the mayor said.

While Cook had some fun with it, Haddad failed to see the humor. “We had walked probably 4,000 homes.”

He blamed the city, which he said lacks leadership under Cook, for the snafu.

“We should have been told in the lottery this is not your ballot position,” Haddad said. In order to fix the situation, Haddad went out and purchased number 10 stickers, stuck them over the 7s, and then sent the fliers back out.

“We have redone all our push cards and all of our information.”

Despite that, Mayor Cook is not going to let this go. “As Gus would tell you, punch 7 on the 9th!”

Election Day is May 9, and the last day to register is this Thursday. Early voting starts April 27. Find more information by clicking on the links to the left.