Ricardo Bordallo attended the University of San Francisco before returning to Guam and becoming a successful businessman and car dealer.

However, due to the contentious Democratic campaign, Bordallo-Taitano lost in the general election to the Republican team of incumbents Carlos G. Camacho and Kurt S. Moylan.

She sponsored many civil cultural events including the Guam Symphony and a program for instructing children in the Suzuki method of violin.

Calvo ran as a write-in candidate in the general election, drawing support from Camacho-Moylan, and Bordallo-Sablan won by less than 600 of the 22,000-plus votes.

[citation needed] During this time the issue of independence, statehood, commonwealth status or continuation as a U.S. territory was put to the voters.

Bordallo was successful in securing $367 million for typhoon reconstruction, capital improvement project and Government of Guam investments.

In 1978, Bordallo ran for re-election with a former University of Guam president Dr. Pedro C. Sanchez as his running mate for lieutenant governor.

Lieutenant Governor Sablan declared his candidacy for the gubernatorial election and was a candidate in the September 1978 Democratic primary, along with his running mate for Lt.

Promising to guide Guam out of the recession and push for commonwealth status, the Bordallo/Reyes ticket defeated incumbent Governor Calvo in the 1982 elections.

His convictions on eight counts of bribery and extortion were overturned in August 1988, leaving charges of obstruction of justice and witness tampering.

[1] After his failed appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, Bordallo faced a four-year sentence in a federal minimum-security prison beginning on February 1, 1990.

Three hours before he was scheduled to be transferred to a prison in Boron, California on (1990-01-31)January 31, 1990, the former Governor killed himself in Hagåtña by wrapping himself in a flag of Guam, chaining himself to statue of Chief Kepuha (also Quipuha, Guam's first native chief to convert to Roman Catholicism) located along Marine Corps Drive (the island's primary thoroughfare), and shooting himself in the head with a .38 caliber pistol.