ALPINE, Texas — Protests and riots around the country have centered around George Floyd, a black man who died in police custody.
Now a Brewster County Sheriff's candidate thinks someone is taking advantage of all this turmoil to make him look like a racist.
This all centers around a series of tweets that claim to come from Devon Portillo. The tweets all make racist comments.
He tells NewsWest 9 he didn't do it.
The tweets circulated around social media over the weekend shows what looks like a screen shot of Portillo's twitter account, along with his picture.
It shows several tweets using the n-word. The date on the tweets show they were posted in 2013.
NewsWest 9 spoke with Portillo and he echoed the same response that you'll find on his campaign Facebook page.
"There is a very inappropriate message being shared to try and define me as a racist. How this message was created is beyond my knowledge. If anybody knows me, you know I am not racist,” he wrote. "I enjoy company and relationships with anybody, regardless of your color. I will leave this message at that, plain and simple."
As of Monday, Portillo's twitter account is no longer active. He shut it down.
Portillo is thanking his supporters for contacting him about the post going around.
He says, "Due to recent political sabotage of me on social media, I am thankful that most everyone sees through this fraud and how disgraceful it is to exploit the recent tragedy of George Floyd. The timing of these personal attacks is no coincidence."
Portillo says he has taken legal steps to find out who may have hacked his account. He's also filed a formal complaint with Twitter and canceled his account.
Portillo says if anyone comes across any racist comments that claim to come from him or his campaign to contact him. He plans to report it.