Those Who Pay for Ortiz’s Travel Also are Often Campaign Donors, But What are They Getting for Their Money?

Special interest groups and individuals who have paid for U. S. Rep. Solomon P. Ortiz’s extensive travel abroad often overlap as campaign contributors, creating a web of political and financial associations – with Ortiz, and China, at the center.

Public records from the Federal Elections Commission and from the databases of the Center for Responsive Politics show that special-interest groups or individuals have spent altogether more than $300,000 for Ortiz’s travel expenses (2000 to the present) and for contributions to his campaigns (from at least 1992 through 2009).

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Affiliation with one special-interest company proved to be especially problematic for Ortiz. That company was Asia Access Corp., a Houston-based consulting firm that claimed to advance trade between China and the U.S. As previously reported, public documents show that Asia Access paid for four trips to China that Ortiz and his then Chief of Staff Florencio H. Rendon took from April 2000 through March 2005.

Records also show that Ortiz accepted contributions from Asia Access principals Kenneth D. Cohen and his wife, Ping Lee Cohen, even as the Cohens engaged in a criminal immigration plot to bring Chinese nationals into the United States illegally from April 2000 through October 2005. The Cohens were indicted by a federal grand jury in October 2005. The Cohens have since divorced.

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Between 2000 and 2003, the Cohens did consulting work for the Brownsville Navigation District, apparently while their illegal immigration scheme was ongoing. The Cohens accompanied BND board directors and staff to China two times as their tour guides and consultants, in 2001 and 2002, the Herald found in an investigation in 2006.

The BND took Ortiz and Rendon on the same two trips to China, according to former BND officials and the recollection of present BND officials.

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Ping Lee’s defense attorneys were a former U.S. Attorney and a lawyer in one of the law firms of Filemon B. Vela Jr. Those lawyers are not believed to have been involved with the trips to China.

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In June 2005, a long-fought quest by Ortiz paid off: The federal courthouse in Brownsville was in part named after Filemon B. Vela Jr.’s late father, U.S. District Judge Filemon B. Vela.

The bill naming the courthouse the Reynaldo G. Garza–Filemon B. Vela United States Courthouse was signed into law by President George W. Bush on June 29, 2005. Ortiz introduced the legislation to name the courthouse in April 1998 and pursued it through ensuing congresses until he finally succeeded in 2005.

“The central issue on the timing of the legislation was the passing of both great judges (in 2004), a stipulation before a name is attached to federal infrastructure,” Borjón said in his written statement.

Also in 2005, Vela Jr.’s law office paid for a “fact-finding” trip to China for Ortiz and Rendon. Travel dates were Aug.1-14, and the cost was $22,200.

Read more: (Emma Perez-Treviño, “Ortiz Travel Backers are Often Campaign Contributors,” Valley Morning Star, 10/18/2010)