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Republican gubernatorial candidate Susana Martinez speaks Wednesday at First Step Center for this year's Tough Enough to Wear Pink breast cancer awareness campaign.
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Chonita Aguirre called her granddaughter Susana Martinez "la abogadita," the little lawyer.

Even as a girl, Martinez, the Republican gubernatorial candidate in New Mexico, had a gift for talking, a knack for enticing cousins and other children to do things her way, a leadership trait her abuelita and others quickly recognized.

"She was muy bossy, always ordering the other kids around," said Jake Martinez Jr., Susana's older brother and the owner of an East El Paso uniform store.

The bossy little lawyer grew up in El Paso's Lower Valley. She eventually became a real lawyer and a New Mexico prosecutor, the district attorney for the 3rd Judicial District in Doña Ana County.

Now Martinez, a Las Cruces Democrat-turned-Republican, is trying to convince New Mexico voters that she is qualified to be governor.

If elected Nov. 2, the El Paso native would become the first female Hispanic governor in the United States. No woman has ever been elected governor in New Mexico.

Martinez is running against Democrat Lt. Gov. Diane Denish of Hobbs. It has been at least 20 years since someone from the southern half of New Mexico has been governor.

Republican Garrey Carruthers, then a professor at New Mexico State University, served from 1987 to 1991. Democrat Jerry Apodaca, originally from Las Cruces, served as governor in the mid-1970s.

The race has attracted national media attention because of its historic implications. Martinez's handlers said she did not have

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time to do press interviews any time last week.

Relatives, former teachers and classmates at Riverside High School paint Martinez as a competitive but unpretentious individual who showed leadership potential as a teenager.

If elected, Martinez will have gone a long way from Thomas Manor, a working-class neighborhood just a stone's throw from Mexico, to the majestic New Mexico Governor's Mansion in Santa Fe.

"Some people call it luck. My dad had that," Jake Martinez Jr. said. "Susana has always been there at the right time at the right place."

Martinez, the youngest of three children, grew up in a modest brick house just across the street from Riverside High School, where she graduated with honors in 1977 and where she served as student council president and was a cheerleader. The mostly Hispanic school prides itself on sending more students to Ivy League schools than any other school in El Paso during part of the 1990s.

Moises Bujanda, a political consultant in Austin who also graduated from Riverside High School in 1977, remembers Susana as an academic achiever with many friends.

"Susana's always been very competitive but very charismatic, very down-to-earth, not pretentious at all," Bujanda said. "She would befriend almost everyone she met."

Bujanda predicts that Martinez has a good shot at becoming the next governor of New Mexico.

"It's nice to see someone from that part of town stand out in New Mexico and also on the national agenda," Bujanda said.

Jake Martinez Jr. is four years older than Susana, who takes care of their sister, Leticia, who has special needs.

Susana was born July 14, 1959, to Jacobo and Paula Martinez. Both parents grew up in El Paso's Segundo Barrio. Jake Sr., a Golden Gloves star and later a boxing coach, served with the Marines in Korea. He worked as a deputy sheriff and then started his own security firm.

Susana's mother worked many years as a secretary and later helped run the family business.

"Both our parents worked, so we were what is termed latch- key kids," Jake Martinez Jr. said.

Before moving in 1960 into Thomas Manor, then a new development surrounded by farmland, the family lived in public housing for a while.

Susana attended six years at Our Lady of the Valley Parochial School before moving into the public school system.

Her childhood in the tight-knit Mexican-American neighborhood often consisted of playing outdoor games like kick the can and waiting for the Farmer's Dairy ice-cream truck to cruise by at midmorning.

"She's come a long way," Jake Martinez Jr. said. "She's been a hard worker, always the one to take the bull by the horns."

Jake Martinez Jr. recalls that his sister was certified to carry a firearm by the time she was 18.

"Susana was just one of those girls who had it all together at a very young age," he said. "My dad would take her to work the bingos and the parties and all of that stuff. She was out there guarding parking lots."

Susana has lived in New Mexico since the mid-1980s. Her brother said she remains close to family, always attending birthday parties and other functions in El Paso when not on the road campaigning.

She loves inviting her family to her home in the desert with a clear view of the Organ Mountains. She also enjoys cooking for her family. Sometimes, she chokes up while talking of difficult child-abuse cases she has handled over the years, according to her brother.

She prosecuted the high-profile case involving the kidnapping, rape and murder of Carly Martinez, a New Mexico State University student from El Paso. Two men were eventually convicted and sent to prison.

Susana's mother died a few years ago. Her father has dementia, which Jake Jr. attributes to blows to the head he received as a boxer.

Opposition ads often have portrayed Susana as being too Texan to lead New Mexico. Jake Martinez Jr. suggests her roots remain in El Paso but her heart belongs to New Mexico.

"She's New Mexico all the way," he said. "Like a lot of kids who graduate from college, she wanted to be away from home but still close enough that she could come and visit."

At Riverside High School, hardly anybody remembers Susana. She was honored in 1989 as an outstanding ex-student for her work as an assistant district attorney.

Riverside teachers picked Susana the 1977 All-Ranger Girl for her academic achievements and involvement in student projects. She was often called Susan or Susie. Lionel Nava, a retired principal and former teacher at Riverside High, remembers Susana as a student leader who stood out.

"She was well-grounded and took her studies seriously," Nava said. "She had plenty of friends like a typical high-school kid, but she took care of the academics."

For Susana's El Paso kin, her path from humble roots in a working-class neighborhood in El Paso's Lower Valley to New Mexico politics and the national spotlight seems almost like a fairy tale. All that's missing for the former little El Paso girl who loved to talk is a potential happy ending - victory at the New Mexico polls on Nov. 2.

Big brother Jake Jr. recalls that some family members were skeptical when Susana said she was running for New Mexico governor. They worried the odds were against her.

Nobody in the Martinez family is ruling her out anymore.

"Some of us said, yeah right. She seemed too far behind," Jake Martinez Jr. said. "Now, she can see the finish line."

Ramón Rentería may be reached at rrenteria@elpasotimes.com; 546-6146.

Susana Martinez

  • Birth date: July 14, 1959, in El Paso, youngest of three children.
  • Parents: Jacobo and Paula Martinez. Her mother is deceased.
  • Immediate family: Husband Chuck Franco is the Doña Ana County undersheriff. She has a stepson.
  • Education: Bachelor's degree in 1981 from the University of Texas at El Paso; law degree in 1986 from the University of Oklahoma.
  • Day job: She has been the district attorney in New Mexico's 3rd Judicial District since 1996.
    Source: Associated Press