Ernesto "Ernie" Cardenas (Valente Rodriguez)

Ernie Cardenas[edit]

Ernesto "Ernie" Cardenas (Valente Rodriguez) has been George's best friend since the second grade. Ernie is a former co-worker. He works on the assembly line at Power Bros. Aviation, he started as a regular worker who later on became the Assembly Line's Team Leader. He is an incompetent, big-eared, clumsy but loyal and lovable character. He is often very shy around women and cannot seem to ever get a date due to his awkwardness and overall inability to connect with women, let alone talk to them. He has a huge crush on Angie, and can often be seen hitting on her, much to George's distaste. He claims to be jealous of George's life. His mother is morbidly obese, and lots of jokes are made about her, especially by George and Benny (and sometimes Angie). He used to live with his parents until George inspired him to get his own apartment. He's also a foster father to Max's best friend, Ricky.
Ernie is depicted as silly, socially awkward, and very loyal to George. He is often at George's house conversing with the family and has very few other friends. He consistently strives to pick up women but to no avail. Flashbacks are made to when George and Ernie were friends and classmates in grade school. Ernie is roughly the same age as George and also works at Power Bros. Aviation. He likes everyone in the family except for Benny, who sometimes bark at each other due to differences in personality.
It was said in one episode that he was apparently born in a bathtub, due to his mom being overweight and she apparently didn't even know she was pregnant with Ernie. George adds to this by replying that Ernie's mother sneezed and he "popped out to her shoulders".
At one point, he was engaged to Ricky's mom Tammy because she was pregnant with another man's baby and he wanted a family. Later, they broke up because Tammy still wanted to sleep around when her and Ernie got married. His catchphrase is "Golly!". One joke was made by George when Ernie asked if George listen to his voicemail. ("I don't listen to any of your messages. You call me every time you see a hot girl and then you take up five minutes of my voicemail going 'George! George! George!'") Ernie's inept social skills and inability to talk to women is obviously a result of the over sheltered childhood and that his parents own problems rubbed off on him. Ernie is somewhat envious of George, because that they grew up together but George's life led to a beautiful wife two children and him being manager, while Ernie gained no such things and has been on the manufacturing floor for almost 30 years. On Lopez Tonight, the real George Lopez stated that he had a best friend named Ernie in real life who he based the character off of