Sunday Xtra: District 79 candidates face-off

EL PASO, Texas - Early voting starts Monday. ABC-7 Xtra Sunday edition examines one race that pits two states representatives against each other.

The 2020 census led to the redrawing of Texas district maps, eliminating District 76. Claudia Ordaz-Perez held the District 76 seat.

But she is now running to represent District 79, currently held by Art Fierro.

What followed was political maneuvering, a change of address, and finger-pointing that led to a court battle to try to keep Ordaz-Perez from running to represent District 79.

That attempt failed, and now the two will face off during the democratic primary, with no Republican candidate.
In essence, whoever wins the primary, wins the seat.

Sunday Xtra host Saul Saenz asked both candidates if they authored and passed legislation while representing El Paso during the previous legislative session.

Fierro claims that according to Texas legislation.com,  he passed numerous bills.

Ordaz-Perez called Fierro out.

"He has not authored and sponsored a single bill that passed this session. And you can look it up go to that website as he's mentioning, and you'll see the record very clear about author and pass," said Ordaz-Perez.

"Using that, now changing the criteria, I'm still at 57, and she's still at 31. So it doesn't matter how you do the math," said Fierro.

"Again, your legislation that you passed, that you authored and passed, $386 million for small business, parental leave, so on and so forth, when you look at what Mr. Fierro, he did not author or pass a single piece of legislation last session," responded Perez.

You can watch the entire contentious exchange, Sunday on ABC 7 Xtra, after ABC-7 weekend at 10 pm.