Tony Gonzales allegedly sent explicit texts to staffer years before fatal affair scandal surfaced

Texas Rep. Tony Gonzales allegedly sent hundreds of sexually explicit text messages to his then-political director in June 2020, pressing her for nude photos and ignoring repeated rejections, according to a new report. The allegations add another layer to the already sordid downfall of the 45-year-old Republican, who dropped his reelection bid earlier this year after revelations about his sexual advances on a subordinate who later died.

The messages reportedly included Gonzales asking the woman, "What kind of panties do you wear?" and urging her to "squeeze my balls." When she turned him down, he allegedly replied that "47 nos is about my limit." On June 15, 2020, he reportedly wrote back with a line that reads less like flirtation and more like a warning:

"I know what I want and won't stop until I get it."

The woman, who has not been publicly identified, told the outlet she replied with a facepalm emoji and urged him not to behave like that in Congress. She denied ever entering a physical relationship with Gonzales. He was sworn into the House of Representatives in early 2021.

A pattern that ended in tragedy

These allegations predate by years the scandal that ultimately brought Gonzales down: his affair with Regina Santos-Aviles, a former aide and mother of one who had privately admitted the relationship to a colleague. The affair reportedly began in 2024, as New York Post reports.

Santos-Aviles died last September after pouring gasoline on herself and being set on fire, in what her family described as an accident. She was about a decade younger than Gonzales.

The former political director reflected on Santos-Aviles' death with visible anger:

"He obviously pursued, pursued, pursued her like he did with me."

She went further:

"I never took him serious[ly]… It wasn't until this poor girl died that I thought, 'No, this guy is pure evil.'"

To her credit, she did not claim total innocence. She acknowledged she "played" along to some degree and said she was "not totally innocent in all this." But the core of her account is one of persistent, unwanted pursuit by a man who held professional power over her. She later volunteered for Republican Brandon Herrera's campaign in 2024.

Gonzales won't resign, but he's done running

Gonzales had acknowledged wrongdoing with Santos-Aviles. Early last month, he went on a conservative talk show and described the ordeal as "a mistake" and "a lapse in judgment." That kind of language might cover a single bad decision. It does not cover what this reporting describes: a years-long pattern of pursuing subordinates who worked for him, beginning before he even took his seat in Congress.

He dropped his reelection bid after getting into a May 26 runoff for his 23rd Congressional District seat against Herrera. But he has declined to step down from the House.

That matters. The House GOP majority stands at 217 to 214, with one independent caucusing with Republicans. Every seat counts, and Gonzales knows it. The political math gives him cover to stay, but the moral math does not.

The problem with "lapse in judgment"

Gonzales is a father of six who shares his children with his wife Angel. None of that personal context excuses what is alleged here, but it makes his talk-show framing even harder to take seriously. You don't send hundreds of explicit messages to a staffer, get rejected dozens of times, write that you "won't stop," and then years later pursue another subordinate because of a single "lapse in judgment."

A lapse is forgetting your anniversary. This is a pattern.

Conservatives rightly hold that character matters in public life. That principle cannot be selectively applied based on party affiliation. When Republicans demanded accountability from Democrats over workplace misconduct scandals, the argument was never "only when the other side does it." The standard is the standard.

The text messages have not been independently verified, and Gonzales' office has been contacted for comment. Those caveats belong in the record. But the former political director's account aligns uncomfortably well with the trajectory of what happened to Santos-Aviles: persistent pursuit of a woman in a subordinate position, by a man who had the power to shape her career.

One woman walked away. The other didn't get that chance.