Pop star-turned-Dem candidate’s defense of graphic murder video resurfaces in key House race

Bobby Pulido, a Latin Grammy Award-winning Tejano artist and Democratic candidate for Congress, is facing renewed scrutiny over comments he made in 2016 defending a fellow singer's graphic music video that depicted acts of sexual violence and murder.

The video in question is "Fuiste Mía" ("You Were Mine") by Gerardo Ortiz. In it, a man discovers his girlfriend with another man, shoots the lover, then handcuffs the woman to a pole, blindfolds her, gropes her, places her in the trunk of a car and sets the vehicle on fire.

At the time, Pulido dismissed the backlash as a matter of artistic direction.

"I've made videos with suggestive images; some have stayed, others have been edited, and still others were never used. That's the decision of the artist and their team," Pulido said in the 2016 interview.

Pulido also suggested that audiences had grown desensitized to graphic imagery, drawing an analogy to traffic slowing at the scene of an accident.

"What happens when there's a [car] accident? Traffic doesn't flow because people slow down or even stop to see what happened; something similar happens with the regional Mexican genre when these kinds of incidents occur," he said.

While he said he did not always agree with how fellow artists depicted women, Pulido maintained that everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

The resurfaced comments come as Pulido campaigns for Texas' 15th Congressional District, one of the most competitive House races in the country. He is challenging two-term Republican incumbent Rep. Monica De La Cruz, who won her seat in 2024 by defeating Democrat Michelle Vallejo 57.1% to 42.9%.

Pulido, known for hits like "Desvelado" and "Se Murió de Amor," received five Latin Grammy nominations and won Best Tejano Album in both 2022 and 2025. He filed to run for Congress earlier this cycle.

The music video controversy is the latest in a string of past episodes that have drawn attention to his campaign. He has previously been criticized for posting links to explicit websites on his personal X account, and for an image appearing to show him urinating on President Donald Trump's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 2024, he dismissed the social media activity, telling reporters "it's impossible to have Twitter and not watch porn," and said of the Trump star incident that he had only poured water on it as a joke.

In 2018, Pulido drew criticism for performing at a Texas middle school benefit concert alongside a registered sex offender. He has said he was unaware of the individual's status at the time and called the coverage a "nothing story," according to Axios.

Pulido's campaign pushed back on the latest story, framing it as a Republican distraction.

"This is emblematic of national Republicans doing anything and everything to distract voters from what are very real — not based on a fictional video — child abuse accusations against Monica De La Cruz and her refusal to release the Epstein files after thousands of girls were trafficked and abused," a campaign spokesperson said in a statement.

The spokesperson was referring to allegations made by De La Cruz's former husband, Johnny Hernández, during 2021 divorce proceedings, in which he accused her of verbally abusing his 14-year-old daughter from a previous relationship. No charges were filed and no investigation was opened.

"Monica De La Cruz knows she's losing, so she's deploying the RNC to do her dirty work and deliberately mischaracterized a decade-old Spanish-language interview, in which Bobby said he respects artists' right to make their own music – a right that Republicans used to believe in but apparently don't when it comes to their opponents," the spokesperson added.

Republican National Committee spokesman Zach Kraft rejected that defense.

"Bobby Pulido has spent his entire adult life defending perverts and predators while lashing out at members of law enforcement who keep Texans safe. He is a truly sick individual who is morally rotten," Kraft said in a statement.

Both candidates have cleared their primaries. The general election in Texas' 15th Congressional District is set for Nov. 3.