Cuellar, a Laredo Democrat, has represented the state’s 28th District in the U.S. House since 2005. In 2001, Gov. Rick Perry appointed him Texas secretary of state. He currently serves on the Agriculture Committee and the House Homeland Security Committee, where he is the ranking member on the Subcommittee on Border and Maritime Security.
Graybill has served as the legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas since 2005. In 2009, the organization successfully fought the detention of immigrant children at the T. Don Hutto Residential Center, a U.S. Immigration and Customs detention facility in Taylor. A Texas native, she graduated with honors from the University of Texas School of Law in Austin.
Farenthold, a Corpus Christi Republican, is serving his first term as congressman for the state’s 27th District in the U.S. House. Farenthold serves on the Homeland Security, Transportation and Infrastructure, and Government Oversight and Reform committees. He is also a member of the House’s Republican Study Committee and the Tea Party Caucus.
Foster is co-chairman of FosterQuan, LLP and has more than 30 years of experience representing and advising multinational companies on U.S. immigration law. He currently leads the Greater Houston Partnership Task Force on Immigration Reform, a nationwide effort to secure immigration reform legislation.
Garza served as the U.S. ambassador to Mexico from 2002 to 2009. Previously, he served as Texas railroad commissioner from 1999 to 2002 and Texas secretary of state from 1995 to 1997. He is currently a partner and chairman at Vianovo Ventures, a management and communications consultancy, and is counsel in the Mexico City office of the law firm White & Case.
Junco de la Vega is the president and chief executive officer of the Mexican news media company Grupo Reforma and publisher of many of Mexico’s leading newspapers, including Reforma, El Norte and Mural. He also sits on an advisory council for the Harte Research Institute for Gulf of Mexico Studies at Texas A&M University Corpus Christi.
Farrar, a Houston Democrat, has represented District 148 in the Texas House since 1995. She is the House Democratic Caucus leader, vice chairwoman of the Environmental Regulation Committee and serves on the Border and Intergovernmental Affairs Committee. She is also the founder and vice chairwoman of the House's Women's Health Caucus.
Aliseda, a Beeville Republican, is serving his first term in the Texas House for District 35. His current committee assignments include Criminal Jurisprudence, Environmental Regulation, and Voter Identification and Voter Fraud. A former Bee County judge, he has also served on the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles.
Margo, an El Paso Republican, is serving his first term in the Texas House for District 78. He is currently a member of the Appropriations and Land and Resource Management Committees. He is also chairman and chief executive officer of El-Paso based JDW Insurance.
Gonzales, a McAllen Democrat, has represented District 41 in the Texas House since 2004. She currently chairs the Border and Intergovernmental Affairs Committee, sits on the Public Health Committee, serves as general counsel to the House's Mexican American Legislative Caucus and chairs the Immigration Task Force.
Burton is the vice president of intelligence at STRATFOR, a private, Austin-based intelligence firm, where he monitors drug traffickers in Mexico. Burton is the author of the books Ghost and Chasing Shadows, which recount his investigative work as a special agent for the U.S. State Department. He has also served on Gov. Rick Perry’s Border Security Council.
Murguía was elected mayor of Ciudad Juárez, now called the epicenter of Mexico's drug war, in July 2010. He also held the post from 2004 to 2007. A member of the Partido Revolucionario Institucional, Murguía also served two terms as a senator in the Mexican Congress, from 1994 to 1997 and again from 1997 to 2000.
Salinas was first elected mayor of Laredo, home to the nation’s largest inland port, in 2006. He was re-elected to a second term in 2010. Before serving as mayor, Salinas worked for 27 years as an agent in the FBI, where he was charged with developing and maintaining liaison contacts with Mexican law enforcement counterparts.
Acevedo is the founder, president, and chief executive officer of CommuniCard LLC, an Austin-based company that provides bilingual communication solutions for workers and employers. In May, President Barack Obama appointed her to the President's Advisory Commission on Educational Excellence for Hispanics. She holds a master’s degree of science in industrial engineering from Stanford University.
Aldrete has served as senior vice president for the Laredo-based IBC Bank since 2005 and chairs the San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce board of directors. He is also a member of the steering committee for SA 2020, a San Antonio city government planning initiative. He was appointed to the board of directors for the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute and also serves on the Texas Employers for Immigration Reform board of directors.
Staples is serving his second term as Commissioner of the Texas Department of Agriculture. A Republican, he formerly served three terms in the Texas House of Representatives, and two terms in the Texas State Senate. He received a degree in agricultural economics while graduating magna cum laude from Texas A&M University in 1984.
Peña is serving his fifth term representing Hidalgo County's District 40 in the Texas House of Representatives, and his first since switching from the Democratic to the Republican Party in December 2010. He is the chair of the House's Technology Committee, and also is a member of the Homeland Security and Public Safety and Voter Identification and Voter Fraud Committees.
Foster is the former mayor of Eagle Pass, Texas, and a former chairman of the Border Coalition, a group of elected officials and leaders from communities along the Mexican border. In 2009, he testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee about the region's homeland security and immigration reform concerns. He currently serves on the Texas Department of Transportation's Border Trade Advisory Committee.
Reyes, an El Paso Democrat, has represented the state's 16th District in the U.S. House since 1997. He currently serves on the House Armed Service Committee and the Committee on Veterans Affairs and is a former U.S. Border Patrol sector chief. In 2009, he led a congressional delegation to Mexico City, where he met with Mexican president President Felipe Calderón to discuss bilateral security and drug violence.
McCaul, an Austin Republican, has represented the state's 10th District in the U.S. House since 2005. His current assignments include the Committees on Science and Technology and Foreign Affairs, as well as Homeland Security, where he chairs the Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, and Management. He is founded and co-chairs the Congressional High Technology Caucus.
Rodríguez, an attorney, formerly served as the county attorney of El Paso. Rodríguez graduated from the University of Texas-Pan American and received his law degree from the National Law Center at George Washington University. In the Senate, Rodríguez has worked to pass colonial legislation, establish the first environmental state court and develop historic county ethics legislation.
Murdock was appointed the first state demographer of Texas in 2001 and served in the Bush administration as director of the U.S. Census Bureau from 2008 to 2009. He is currently the Allyn R. and Gladys M. Cline Professor of Sociology at Rice University in Houston. Prior to his appointment at Rice, he was the Lutcher Brown Distinguished Chair in Demography and Organization Studies at the University of Texas at San Antonio, and the director of the university's Institute for Demographic and Socioeconomic Research.
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