Bordallo was the lt. governor during Carl T.C. Gutierrez’s two terms as governor, but their relationship has gone sour.
Yona resident Tom Quenga said Gutierrez supporters believe Bordallo should have campaigned for the former governor who lost to Republican Sen. Eddie Calvo by only 583 votes.
Gutierrez garnered 19,296 votes while Calvo received 19,879.
“We’re getting phone calls. We’re hearing it from other villages that Madeleine should have publically endorsed Carl and Frank right after the primary election leading up to the general elections. This was a very close race and losing is hard,” said Quenga.
Another Gutierrez supporter said he has always been a “Bordallocrat” but after seeing her signs at a Republican rally, he felt she had betrayed the Democratic Party of Guam.
“Yes I’m mad. She could have come out and said to the public that even though the Republicans were endorsing her, she was still a Democrat and she supports Carl and [running-mate] Frank [Aguon] and all the senators, but she didn’t,” said William Cruz.
Joshua Tenorio, who got his first political job with Bordallo in 1988, said: “I hope the reports weren’t true that nearly her entire staff were supporting Calvo since people high in the Calvo campaign were saying that all her staff was supporting him because if it’s true, it would be really telling about the future.”
Clifford Guzman, chairman of the Committee to Elect Madeleine Z. Bordallo Chairman, responded: “We share the frustration and disappointment of our fellow Democrat supporters. We did not have the sweeps across the board in both the national and local elections.”
“As Democrats, our victories are achieved because of our unity. While we have maintained the majority in the U.S. Senate, lost the majority in the U.S. House of Representatives, lost the bid to Adelup, and won the majority in the Guam Legislature, our party must concentrate on what we did right, what we need to improve on, and what we need to do in the future to promote continued unity within our party,” he added.
Guzman said Bordallo “is a proud and lifelong Democrat and strongly believes that the Democratic Party has and continues to work for the bests interests of the people of Guam.”
University of Guam Professor Ron McNinch said it was understandable that Gutierrez supporters would react to their candidate’s loss.
“I can understand the sentiment. And I can understand what the people are saying. They’re hurting. It was a very close race. It’s not so much that Madeleine did not endorse him. What matters is that no one was running against her from the Republican side. And that may have been on purpose,” said McNinch.
“Because she had no opponent in the election, that same level of interaction with the Democrats in a normal competitive election wasn’t there,” he said.
