A Texas Republican seeking a seat in Congress has campaigned on his background as a victims’ advocate and aggressive prosecutor, while saying little publicly about his past work defending a domestic violence offender and a man accused of abusing a child.
Court documents reviewed by the Daily Mail show that Eric Flores, a former federal prosecutor, also spent time as a defense lawyer, securing favorable outcomes for men accused of domestic abuse and representing a high school coach accused of making a student work out naked.
Flores, an attorney based in Hidalgo County, Texas, represented at least two men facing felony domestic violence charges, helping both obtain plea agreements that significantly lowered the severity of the allegations and resulted in little jail time.
In a separate civil case, he defended a high school coach who was sued over allegations that he forced a student to exercise without clothes and ignored the boy’s requests to put on underwear.
Flores is now trying to capture Texas’ 34th Congressional District, a Democratic-held coastal seat south of Corpus Christi in an otherwise heavily Republican state.
On the campaign trail, he has leaned heavily on his experience as a federal prosecutor, highlighting a tough-on-crime message and earning the backing of President Donald Trump.
‘I built my life around service,’ Flores wrote on social media site X in August last year.
‘From the courtroom to the southern border, I’ve fought for justice, safety, and integrity, not with talk, but with RESULTS.’
Republican congressional candidate Eric Flores has frequently highlighted his career as a federal prosecutor and his work alongside police agencies throughout his campaign
The GOP hopeful, who is running for Congress in Texas’s 34th District, has received Trump’s endorsement. They are pictured together in February
While visiting a forensic exam center for victims of abuse and assault, he said he would campaign for ‘the care and justice they deserve,’ and cited his prosecutorial record putting ‘child predators behind bars.’
His campaign website said he ‘led landmark prosecutions,’ and he reminded voters he is a ‘former prosecutor who’s fought alongside law enforcement’ in a tweet last November, repeating that he ‘locked up the worst of the worst’ in a February 2026 tweet.
But Flores is far less vocal about his career on the other side of the courtroom, as a defense attorney who at times represented violent criminals.
One of his former clients, Renato Villalon, was charged with striking his then-girlfriend Cynthia Barragan with his hand and restraining her by force in December 2019, exposing her to what prosecutors described as a substantial risk of serious bodily injury.
It was not Villalon’s first offense. He had a prior domestic violence conviction dating back to 2006, making both charges third-degree felonies carrying up to ten years in prison each.
Flores took the case in March 2020. By November, he had negotiated a deal with the district attorney’s office in which the domestic violence charge was dropped entirely.
Villalon pleaded guilty to the remaining unlawful restraint charge and was sentenced to five years of community supervision and 100 hours of community service. He served no jail time.
Flores also represented Guadalupe Lopez Jr., indicted on two separate felony strangulation charges involving two women.
Flores’s previous clients include Renato Villalon (left) who was charged with striking his then-girlfriend with his hand and restraining her by force in December 2019, and Guadalupe Lopez Jr (right) who was indicted on two separate felony strangulation charges involving two women
Flores’s campaign has emphasized his record pursuing human smuggling, fugitive, and organized crime cases during his time as a federal prosecutor – but court records show he later worked as a defense attorney in a number of criminal matters
In a post shared on X last August, he touted his record fighting for ‘justice, safety, and integrity’ and promoting support for victims of crime
In July 2023, Lopez allegedly applied pressure to his girlfriend’s throat, identified in court records under the pseudonym Tanya White, impeding her breathing. Months later, in October 2023, he did the same to another dating partner, Jessica Canales.
Both incidents resulted in grand jury indictments in the summer of 2024. Trying to strangle a domestic partner is a third-degree felony in Texas, carrying a sentence of up to ten years.
With Flores representing him in both cases, Lopez pleaded guilty in December 2025 to a reduced charge in each: simple assault causing bodily injury to a family member, a Class A misdemeanor.
It was a win for Lopez, a significant step down from the original felony counts. He was sentenced to one year in county jail.
Flores also served two months as lead counsel for Robert Vela High School coach Ernie Alonzo, as well as school leaders, in a lawsuit over the coach’s alleged ‘abuse’ of a child.
The lawsuit claimed that in March 2024 Alonzo ordered a minor, identified only as ‘N.R.’, ‘to perform strenuous physical exercise completely nude.’
‘When N.R. attempted to preserve any shred of dignity by covering himself with underwear, Defendant Alonzo threatened and ordered him to remain nude,’ said a civil legal complaint filed in Hidalgo County in September last year.
‘The exercise served no purpose beyond humiliation and domination. Following the act, the Coach secluded himself for unknown and suspicious reasons.’
Flores pictured with House Speaker Mike Johnson
Flores is pictured with his wife and one of their two children
The lawsuit also claimed Alonzo had ‘credible reports of sexual misconduct’ at his last job.
Alonzo and school leadership deny the claims, and the case is being litigated.
While working as a federal prosecutor, Flores earned two US Attorney’s Awards, including for dismantling ‘the district’s largest transnational human-smuggling ring’ and securing the conviction of one of Texas’s top ten most-wanted fugitives.
He is currently a partner at law firm O’Hanlon, Demerath & Castillo.
In a statement to the Daily Mail, Flores’s campaign said that his opponent for the Texas congressional seat, incumbent Democrat Vicente Gonzalez, also has a history defending criminals despite preaching ‘law and order.’
In 2018, Gonzalez referred to himself as a ‘law and order member,’ promised to ‘bring security to our border’ and ensure ‘drugs are not coming across as freely as they are now.’
Clients Gonzalez represented as a criminal defense attorney in the 1990s and 2000s included a long list of drug dealers, a ‘criminal mob’ leader, and men accused of smuggling illegal immigrants into the US.
One client, Elmer Saldivar, was convicted in 2003 of conspiring to distribute eight pounds of the drug Ecstasy – around 15,000 doses.
He got 57 months in prison after Gonzalez asked the court for the ‘lowest end’ of the sentencing guidelines. But in 2010 Saldivar was convicted again for conspiring to sell more than 200 lbs of marijuana.
In 1999 Gonzalez represented Frank Tijerina, reported leader of Texas street gang the ‘Corrupt Criminal Mob’, who was subsequently sentenced to 30 months prison for conspiring to distribute $420,000 of marijuana.
Another client, Efren Hurtado, was convicted in 2000 for possession of a staggering 2,000lbs of marijuana.
In August 2005, Gonzalez negotiated a plea deal to decrease the prison sentence of his client, Marin Martinez-Hernandez, an illegal alien charged with smuggling others across the country for cash.
Janeth Pensado-Callejas also cut a plea deal with Gonzalez’s help after she was charged with conspiring to transport others into the US in 2000.
‘If Vicente Gonzalez wants to compare records, we’re happy to have that fight any day of the week,’ said Christian Martinez, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.
‘Gonzalez built his career defending criminals, smugglers, drug traffickers, and illegal immigrants charged with human smuggling offenses.’
Martinez said Flores ‘served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney where he prosecuted cartel-connected traffickers, dismantled the largest human-smuggling ring in the district, secured the conviction of one of Texas’ “Top Ten” most wanted fugitives, and earned two U.S. Attorney’s Awards for landmark prosecutions targeting transnational criminal operations.’
