ALTON, Texas - Michelle Vallejo is a small business owner, community leader, and advocate for women's economic empowerment. She comes from a big family of farm workers, immigrants, and entrepreneurs.
Her parents, Maribel and Daniel, grew up in northern Mexico, from where they would eventually make their way to the Rio Grande Valley in search of their dreams to build a better life for themselves.
For almost 25 years, her family has managed Los Portales, which serves thousands of people weekly and helps dozens of working-class entrepreneurs start and run their businesses. At the Alton pulga, they like to say, “No somos pulgueros. Somos vecinos.” It is this proud sense of community and work ethic that Michelle carries in all of her work.
Running Pulga Los Portales and serving the larger community is what has profoundly defined their family values and work ethic to this day, Vallejo said, in this Meet the Candidate podcast.
Vallejo is running in the Democratic Party primary for the open Congressional District 15. The seat is open because incumbent U.S. Congressman Vicente Gonzalez has moved to another district.
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