{"id":189819,"date":"2026-03-04T09:16:24","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T09:16:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/189819\/"},"modified":"2026-03-04T09:16:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T09:16:24","slug":"reyna-barrientes-vela-head-to-runoff-in-texas-house-district-125","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/189819\/","title":{"rendered":"Reyna, Barrientes Vela head to runoff in Texas House District 125"},"content":{"rendered":"

Democrats are headed to a runoff in the race to replace retiring state Rep. Ray Lopez (D-San Antonio)<\/a> in Texas House District 125.<\/p>\n

SAISD teachers\u2019 union leader Adrian Reyna<\/a> got 39.06% of the vote, while former Bexar County Constable Michelle Barrientes Vela<\/a> took 34.43%. <\/p>\n

Lopez\u2019s former chief of staff Donovan Rodriguez<\/a> took 15.33% and Carlos Antonio Raymond<\/a> took 11.18%. <\/p>\n

The winner of the Democratic primary is the odds-on favorite to carry the deep blue Westside seat<\/a> in November.<\/p>\n

But since no candidate reached the 50% threshold, Reyna and Barrientes Vela will now compete in a May 26 primary runoff.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Republicans had their own primary for the open seat, and nominated Ricardo Martinez<\/a>, who owns a mixed martial arts school and took 58.63% of the vote in a two-way race.<\/p>\n

As a Bexar County Constable, Barrientes Vela\u2019s office was raided by the FBI and Texas Rangers.<\/a> She was charged with tampering with records and later acquitted<\/a>. During her sentencing, outbursts from her two sons, one of whom cried out, \u201cF\u2014 the DA, f\u2014 the DA,\u201d went viral.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy return to politics is not about politics,\u201d she said at a Jan. 10 forum hosted by the Tejano Democrats. \u201cIt\u2019s about someone with law enforcement experience, someone who\u2019s been a victim of the abuse of power, and someone that knows the passion to fight against an unjust system, and continue that fight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barrientes Vela did not have an election watch party and did not respond to a request for comment through email on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n

Organized labor has rallied around Reyna<\/a>, whose father represented the seat in the early 2000s.<\/p>\n

In a race where no candidate raised much money, Reyna received help from the Texas Organizing Project in the final stretch.<\/p>\n

Bexar County\u2019s 10-member state legislative delegation doesn\u2019t often see turnover.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Reyna has spent most of his career in the classroom, most recently as a middle school history teacher at San Antonio Independent School District.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

He says his experience as a union organizer gives him a different approach than some of the legislature\u2019s longtime Democrats, who control just 62 out of 150 seats in the Texas House, and have been steamrolled on nearly all of their policy priorities in recent years.<\/p>\n

Just last year the Republican-led legislature approved major changes that critics say will divert money away from public schools by allowing taxpayer dollars to be used for private school tuition.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s time for somebody who\u2019s been doing the work at the ground level, and it\u2019s time for a fighter to go up to Austin,\u201d Reyna told the San Antonio Report on election night. \u201cPeople are hungry for a teacher. They\u2019re hungry for a public educator to go make education policy at a time where we\u2019ve seen the very direct and concerted, comprehensive attacks on public education.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reyna is currently on special assignment implementing the district\u2019s rightsizing effort<\/a>. He also represents organized labor on the VIA Metropolitan Transit board<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Board members from Edgewood ISD, SAISD and Northside ISD attended his election watch party on Tuesday night at Sari-Sari, a Filipino restaurant.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Heading into a runoff and possible general election, Reyna said he would keep \u201creframing\u201d issues like property taxes, small business concerns and workforce issues through the lens of public education.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe conversation around public education \u2014 some folks don\u2019t fully grasp the impact that it can have just on the strength of a community, the strength of a democracy, the strength of our economy,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Democrats are headed to a runoff in the race to replace retiring state Rep. Ray Lopez (D-San Antonio)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":189820,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[8519,75424,75425,75426,10827,4042,82,84,83,75427,53285,50284,3028,15354,6251],"class_list":["post-189819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-2026-election","tag-adrian-reyna","tag-bexar-county-constable","tag-donovan-rodriguez","tag-michelle-barrientes-vela","tag-saisd","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news","tag-state-rep-ray-lopez","tag-tejano-democrats","tag-texas-house-district-125","tag-typedaily","tag-union","tag-wc-500-750"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189819\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/189820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}