Veteran’s activist many not run for Congress after all

A prominent Vietnam veteran who said in July he was running against U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce, R-N.M., is having second thoughts.

Rick Bolaños said today he is undecided about whether he wants to join two other Democrats in the race because he’s having a hard time lining up the support he needs.

“We’ll probably know in the next 10 days,” Bolaños said.

Bolaños told me in mid-July that he was “absolutely” running and would officially declare his candidacy within days, but it never happened. Since then, Bolaños has not attended a number of Democratic Party events, including the recent Labor Day breakfast in Las Cruces. Many Democrats said they hadn’t seen or heard from him recently and were beginning to question whether he was serious about running.

Bolaños said today that he has been out of touch for a couple of weeks because he was in Mexico.

Until recently, Bolaños lived in east El Paso, but he and his family moved to La Mesa in southern Doña Ana County in January and opened a personal health-care business there.

Bolaños and his three brothers served in Vietnam at the same time, and they have become nationally known veterans’ activists who traveled with John Kerry during the 2004 presidential race. Bolaños is the co-chair of the veteran’s outreach team for Gov. Bill Richardson’s 2008 presidential campaign.

Bolaños ran in 2006 against former U.S. Rep. Henry Bonilla, R-Texas. Mid-way through that election cycle, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld most of the controversial 2003 Texas redistricting, but forced the redrawing of Bonilla’s district.

It also ordered a vote on Election Day 2006 that included all candidates who wanted to run, with a runoff in December if no candidate received 50 percent.

Bolaños was already in the race at the time, but he was joined by five other Democrats after the ruling. He withdrew before the election, saying lack of funding was a factor but also that he “took one for the team” because, with so many Democrats in the race, Bonilla was likely to be re-elected. Democrat Ciro Rodriguez ended up winning the race.

The other two Democrats in the race to take on Pearce next year are Doña Ana County Commissioner Bill McCamley and Al Kissling, who ran unsuccessfully against Pearce last year.