Henry Gabriel Cisneros
10th United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
In office January 22, 1993 – January 19, 1997
President	Bill Clinton
Preceded by	Jack Kemp
Succeeded by	Andrew Cuomo
Personal details
Born	50px (1947-06-11) June 11, 1947 (age 77) San Antonio, Texas
Died	50px
Resting place	50px
Political party	Democratic
Spouse	Mary Alice Perez
Children	Teresa Cisneros Mercedes Cisneros John Paul Cisneros
Parent	50px
Alma mater	Texas A&M University John F. Kennedy School of Government (Harvard University) George Washington University

Henry Gabriel Cisneros (born June 11, 1947)^[1] is an American politician and businessman. He was the first person of Hispanic background elected as mayor of a large American city, and later served as the 10th Secretary of Housing and Urban Development from 1993 to 1997. He left public office as a result of a controversy involving payments to his former mistress, in which he pleaded guilty to making false statements to federal officials. He is currently Executive Chairman to CityView, an investment company that finances homebuilders with over 6,000 homes in its investment portfolio.

The son of Elvira and George Cisneros, Henry Cisneros was born in San Antonio, Texas. He was one of three brothers and two sisters. He received his primary education at Central Catholic Marianist High School in San Antonio, and later received a Bachelor of Arts and an Master of Arts in urban and regional planning from Texas A&M University. He earned an additional Master of Public Administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and a Doctor of Public Administration from George Washington University. He married Mary Alice Perez in 1969. They have two daughters, Teresa and Mercedes, and a son, John Paul.

In 1975, Cisneros was elected to the San Antonio City Council, at the time becoming the youngest councilman in the city's history (until current San Antonio City Councilor Chip Haas's election in 2003 at age 26). Cisneros noted that the Democratic party he joined was leftist but has become more central by the mid 1990s.^[2] He served for six years on the City Council and was elected Mayor of San Antonio in 1981. San Antonio at the time was the ninth-largest city in the nation. Cisneros became the first Mexican American to head a major American city. He was well liked by his constituency and was reelected to three additional two-year terms, which meant he served four terms as mayor overall. His popularity did not rest with San Antonio's Hispanic community alone, but with all ethnic groups in the area. In 1982, he was selected as one of the "Ten Outstanding Young Men of America" by the U.S. Jaycees.

As mayor of San Antonio, Cisneros began to attract national attention for his success in developing new growth in the city's business sector, and in 'promoting cooperation' among the city's various ethnic groups. In a Spanish-language interview published during the 1980s in El Diario newspaper in the border town Piedras Negras, Cisneros declared that he wanted to be President of the United States.^{[citation needed]} In 1984, Democratic presidential nominee Walter Mondale tapped Cisneros as a finalist for the vice presidential nomination, which eventually went to U.S. Rep. Geraldine Ferraro. [1] In 1986, City and State Magazine named him Outstanding Mayor.

Also while mayor, Cisneros had a well-publicized affair with constituent Linda Medlar. The affair did not end until 1991, when Cisneros's wife filed for divorce; although the couple reconciled and the divorce action was dropped, the affair would nonetheless come back to haunt Cisneros in the future. Nonetheless, in 1991, VISTA Magazine awarded him with its Hispanic Man of the Year honor.

In 1989, Cisneros left public office and became chairman of the Cisneros Asset Management Company, a national asset-management firm for tax-exempt organizations. He also served as deputy chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, and was a board member of the Rockefeller Foundation. In 1990, citizens urged Cisneros to run for governor of Texas but a family crisis forced him to change his goals. His son, John Paul, had been born in 1987 with a heart defect. At the time, doctors did not know if surgery could correct his problem. (He finally underwent successful surgery in late 1993). His son's health became his biggest priority, and Cisneros wished to stay close to home to spend as much time as possible with his family. He also turned down an appointment as a U.S. senator from Texas in 1993 for the seat formerly held by Lloyd Bentsen, who had been nominated as Secretary of the Treasury.

Cisneros was nominated by President Bill Clinton to serve as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, and was unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate. He was sworn into office by Chief Justice William Rehnquist on January 22, 1993. During his term, he reformed the public housing system, and successfully resisted efforts to substantially reduce or wholly eliminate the Department. One goal of the Clinton administration was to increase home ownership, especially among minorities. Cisneros, also in favoring this prior to enter Clinton administration, made this a priority. When Cisneros arrived at HUD, the home ownership rate was 63.7 percent. When he left office in 1997 it had risen to 65.7 percent. At the end of Clinton's second term it had continued this upward trend to 67.5 percent.^[3] As the Clinton administration’s top housing official in the mid-1990s, Mr. Cisneros loosened mortgage restrictions so first-time buyers could qualify for loans they could never get before - contributing to the the great housing and financial crisis that began 10 years later.^[4]

Citing the needs of his family, he resigned as Secretary in January 1997 while under a cloud of personal and political scandal.

In March 1995, U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno secured the appointment of an Independent Counsel, David Barrett to investigate allegations that Cisneros had lied to FBI investigators during background checks prior to being named Secretary of HUD. He had been asked about payments that he had made to former mistress Linda Medlar, also known as Linda Jones. The affair had been 'public knowledge' for a number of years - during the 1992 presidential campaign, George H. W. Bush's Treasurer Catalina Vasquez Villalpando (R) publicly referred to Cisneros and candidate Clinton as "two skirt-chasers." Cisneros lied about the amount of money he had paid to Medlar. The investigation continued for three and a half years.

In December 1997, Cisneros was indicted on 18 counts of conspiracy, giving false statements and obstruction of Justice. Medlar used some of the Cisneros hush money to purchase a house and entered into a bank fraud scheme with her sister and brother-in-law to conceal the source of the money. In January, 1998, Medlar pleaded guilty to 28 charges of bank fraud, conspiracy to commit bank fraud and obstruction of justice.

In September 1999, Cisneros negotiated a plea agreement, under which he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of lying to the FBI, and was fined $10,000. He did not receive jail time or probation. He was pardoned by President Bill Clinton in January 2001.

Upon resigning from his post as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Cisneros became president of Univision, a Spanish-language television network. Cisneros serves as a board member for Latino Public Broadcasting, the American Democracy Institute and Live Nation. He also joined the boards of a major builder, KB Home, and the largest mortgage lender in the nation, Countrywide Financial — two companies that rode the housing boom, drawing criticism along the way for abusive business practices.^[5]

In August 2000, he formed American City Vista, a joint venture with KB Home for the purpose of building homes in central areas of major metropolitan areas. American City Vista was later transformed into CityView, with Henry Cisneros as Chairman and Joel Shine as President. With offices in Santa Monica, California, and San Antonio, Texas, CityView provides financing to housing developers, as well as acting as a builder. In 2006, Builder Magazine named Cisneros #18 out of the top 50 most influential people in the real estate industry.

• CityView homepage
• Biography
• Collection of articles from the Washington Post about the Cisneros investigation
• Office of Independent Counsel David Barret
• NY Times Article