Early session partisan fireworks over House leadership sizzled to one of the least productive legislative sessions in memory.
“ Those fireworks led Rep. Andy Nunez (Doña Ana) to change his voter registration from “D” to “DTS” (Declined to State), and not much else except a gentleman from Doña Ana County losing much of his stature by gaining Speaker Ben Lujan’s wrath.
New executives are said to have a honeymoon period when they have the greatest political capital they are likely to ever have (there are exceptions, like George W. Bush after 9/11).
Gov. Susana Martinez used this political clout to push for campaign promise issues like repealing driver’s licenses for foreign nationals, the Defense of Marriage Act, pro-life issues, DNA testing
for felony arrests, eliminating ! lm industry subsidies, Wisconsin-like reduction of collective bargaining rights (by dismissing the state’s Labor Board), requiring photo IDs to vote, reinstating the death penalty and cutting the state budget.
From every indication, she pushed these issues in hopes of using them against Democrats in next year’s elections when the 102 New Mexico legislative seats are up for re-election.
To that end, she used her staff to videotape Democrats at committee meetings in the act of opposing said issues, sent attack robo-calls to Democratic legislators’ constituents and paid for anti-immigration radio advertisements out of her campaign budget (something that is arguably legal but perhaps not ethical).
In addition, Dianna Duran, the first Republican N.M. Secretary of State since the 1930s, rushed a cross-check of driver’s licenses issued without a Social Security number and voter rolls on the governor’s behalf. Duran came up with 37 names (out of 1.6 million voters) that she announced as unlawful to put a greater wedge on
the issue before the session ended.
Our governor didn’t seem to use her clout to create jobs, improve the economy or balance the budget. At most, these issues seemed
to take a backseat to more ideologically oriented issues.
For its part, the Legislature seemed locked into group think that making cuts was the only way to balance the budget. Democratic legislators and the Democratic Party of New Mexico paid for ads responding to Martinez’s ads. “ These ads asserted Martinez
was wasting the legislative session by not addressing job creation and the economy. “ They said that the governor was still campaigning and not governing.
With soaring campaign expenditures, ever- expanding campaign seasons and a U.S.
Supreme Court consistently equating money — even corporate money — to speech, this evolutionary legislative cycle in political spending
is frightening. Like environmental groups did over Martinez’s unilateral decision to not publish (and thereby not put into eff ect) laws and rules passed under the Richardson administration, labor unions and the ACLU joined the fray by taking the governor to court for dismissing the labor board.
Immigrant rights groups, the ACLU and open-government groups requested to inspect documents used to determine the 37 voters who didn’t show their Social Security numbers when applying for driver’s licenses.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
Many questioned the methodology. Bernalillo County Clerk Maggie Toulouse Oliver also ! led a public information request with the SOS and cautioned New Mexicans that “prematurely revealing information” without a peer or public vetting “is concerning.”
A great deal of wrangling went into capping annual film industry subsidies at $50 million, yet Martinez pushed hard to get a tax deduction on locomotive fuel to bring a Union Pacific Railroad facility to Santa Teresa, N.M.
At no time were tax expenditures, reductions or other revenue-side budget balancing solutions seriously considered, not even the loophole that allows out-of-state corporations not to be taxed for in-state pro! ts. N.M. is one of two states with this loophole. Only budget-, program- and services-cutting measures were entertained.
“ The only light in the revenue-side discussion was the passing of Sen. Tim Keller’s (D-Albuquerque) SB 47 and Rep. Eleanor Chavez’s (DAlbuquerque) HB 161. “ These bills (they were amended to be one bill) would require the Secretary of Budget and Taxation to create a tax expenditures budget. Although this bill would not generate revenues for this ! scal year (FY 12), it will allow the administration and the Legislature to take an annual peek into where tax expenditures are going and their effectiveness. Martinez said she supports the bill.
