Richard Raymond

Richard Peña Raymond was born in Alice, Texas and raised in Benavides, Texas (population 1,900) graduating from the high school there. He got involved in politics as a very young man fighting political corruption in his home county of Duval. Representative Raymond received a B.A. from the University of Texas at Austin, majoring in Government and minoring in History. He later received a J.D. from the University of Texas School of Law. Before being elected to the Texas Legislature, he worked for United States Senators Lloyd Bentsen from Texas and Paul Simon from Illinois. He also worked for Texas Land Commissioner Garry Mauro and Texas Railroad Commissioner Bob Krueger. In 1992, Mr. Raymond first ran for and was elected to the Texas House of Representatives, where he would represent a rural South Texas District that included the counties of Duval, Jim Wells, Live Oak, Wilson, Atascosa, McMullen and La Salle. After serving in the Texas House for 6 years, he then ran for Texas Land Commissioner. Although he received nearly 1.5 million votes as the Democratic Party nominee, he lost to Republican David Dewhurst. Two years later, in January 2001, Mr. Raymond was once again elected to…