Suit filed to disqualify surprise Democrat in Lafayette mayor-president race

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A lawsuit challenging the qualification of Priscilla Gonzalez in the race for Lafayette’s mayor-president was filed Wednesday morning by a local good government activist. The suit claims Gonzalez failed to meet the residency requirements of Lafayette’s Home Rule Charter and that she falsely certified she had filed federal and state income tax returns over the past five years.

On Aug. 10, the final day of qualifying for the Oct. 14 election, Gonzalez registered to vote in Louisiana and signed qualification papers to run as a Democrat, joining a field of three Republicans, incumbent Mayor-President Josh Guillory, Jan Swift and Monique Blanco Boulet.
Gonzalez, a political unknown in Lafayette who previously ran for mayor of Corpus Christi, cuts an unusual profile for a mayoral candidate. A self-described “leftist,” she’s taken flack for brandishing campaign swag supporting Republican gubernatorial frontrunner Jeff Landry, a bogeyman of Louisiana progressives and Democrats.
Her candidacy is being challenged on the grounds that she does not meet the one-year residency and domiciliary requirements of Lafayette’s Home Rule Charter, which provides that candidates have been “legally domiciled within the parish for at least one (1) year immediately preceding the time established by law for qualifying for office.”

Gonzalez says she is “up for the challenge.”

“They can bring anything they want against me. They just don’t know my history,” she says. “They don’t know I actually sue people for a living.
“I have a case in federal court right now, and there’s nothing more that I love than going to court. … This is fun for me. This is my extracurricular activity,” Gonzalez adds, explaining that she works on a contract basis for personal injury lawyers and people who have been wrongfully terminated. Gonzalez, who has a degree in political science, says she did coursework to become a paralegal but did not complete the certification process. She is not an attorney.

Lafayette Parish Clerk of Court Louis Perret told the Acadiana Advocate that when Gonzalez first arrived at the courthouse to qualify as a candidate she was not registered to vote in Louisiana and did not have a valid Louisiana driver’s license. According to the lawsuit, her driver’s license and vehicle were still registered to Texas at that time; she ran for mayor of Corpus Christi in 2020.

Gonzalez told the paper she left the courthouse and obtained a Louisiana driver’s license, registered to vote and returned to Perret’s office to qualify

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“Either you have remained here with the intent to make Lafayette your permanent home for the past 12 months or not,” says attorney Gary McGoffin, who is representing Aimee Boyd Robinson, the suit’s petitioner.

Gonzalez falsely claimed on qualifying papers that she had filed her federal and state income tax returns for the past five years, according to the suit, an allegation McGoffin says is supported by information from the Louisiana Department of Revenue, which confirmed it has no record of her ever filing tax returns in the state.
Gonzales maintains she filed her federal income tax return for 2022 and is “pretty sure there is an extension” for her Louisiana tax return.

Her surprise entry is reminiscent of the M-P race four years ago, when Carlos Harvin entered the race at the 11th hour as the only Democrat in a field of Republicans and one no-party candidate. Harvin appeared at campaign events and in campaign materials with Guillory; upon Guillory’s election, he created a new position, chief of minority affairs, and appointed Harvin to the post.

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