White Dallas City Council member busted for dressing up in Mexican 'brownface' for City Hall party

A white Dallas City Council member with an eye on the mayor's office is under fire for donning a sombrero, serape and fake mustache to impersonate a Mexican at a City Hall Halloween party, reports the Dallas Observer.

According to the report, Jennifer Staubach Gates who holds a seat on the nonpartisan council was busted for posting pictures of herself and other City Hall staffers on Facebook -- including one of her wearing the Halloween getup.

On her post she wrote, "Halloween fun started at the #MayorsMonsterMash work party which included the Best Margarita in Dallas #lime, #tequila & #salt."

The post (see screenshot below) has since been taken down, with the Observer's Jim Schutze noting, "Some political observers — well, me — have always wondered how Gates, a product of affluent white North Dallas, would establish rapport with voters as a citywide candidate in a blue-voting diverse city. The photo of herself on Facebook in what could be called brown-face answers that question. Not well."

He added, "But Gates did that. So that means one of two things. Either Jennifer Staubach Gates, daughter of real estate developer and onetime football great Roger Staubach, does not intend to run for mayor of Dallas, nor does she want to run for anything else and maybe she wants to get off the City Council right away and spend time with her g-monkeys. Or it means she didn’t know about the don’t-dress-up-ever-never rule for white politicians."

Schutze did not indicate whether he had attempted to contact the lawmaker.

You can see a screenshot of the post below via the Observer: