San Antonio Councilman Manny Pelaez calls colleague John Courage a ‘buffoon’ for rejoining mayor’s race

Councilman and mayoral candidate Manny Pelaez fired off a mean tweet Friday afternoon after his colleague John Courage surprised political observers by rejoining the race to replace termed-out Mayor Ron Nirenberg.

In December, 73-year-old Courage said in a since-deleted tweet that he was withdrawing from the mayoral race, citing health concerns and wanting to spend more time with his wife.

However, in a shocking twist hours before the filing deadline, the District 9 councilman changed his mind and submitted paperwork to jump back into the contest, the Express-News reports.

That apparently didn’t sit right with Pelaez.

“If you ever wondered what buffoonery looks like, here is Exhibit A,” the District 8 councilman said in a tweet, linking the Express-News article on Courage’s decision to rejoin.

“There is only room for serious people in this mayoral race,” Pelaez added.

Although Courage hasn’t explained why he changed his mind, in a tweet of his own he railed against outside money influencing the race and “tech bro” Beto Altamirano, a mayoral candidate who designed the mobile app for the city’s 311 system.

“Elon Musk is canning thousands of Federal Civil Servants in our country,” Courage wrote in his Friday post on the social media platform X. “Now another ‘tech bro’ wants to be your mayor.”

Council members often are the most viable contenders in San Antonio mayoral races. However, this time around, a raft of high-profile and well-funded outsiders including Altimirano, former Under Secretary of the Air Force Gina Ortiz Jones and former Texas Secretary of State Rolando Pablos have stolen much of the thunder. 

Our guess is the tweets are only going to get meaner from here.

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This article appears in Feb 5-18, 2025.