Good News And Less Good News From New Mexico Primaries Tuesday

Mostly better than Republicans: Pelosi, Schumer, Lujan

Three predictions: 1- Teresa Leger Fernandez, who just won the Democratic primary in New Mexico's 3rd district (the seat Ben Ray Luján is leaving for his Senate run, will be sworn into Congress next January, if we still have a functioning democracy. The PVI is D+8 and in 2016 Trump was crushed there (36.7% of the vote). 2- Leger Fernandez will have the comfy congressmember job for decades. 3- Leger Fernandez will never accomplish anything in Congress.

Last August, in looking at the NM-03 primary, I wrote that I had high hopes that Valerie Plame, who has certainly served the country well, might be the progressive I was looking for but... I still wasn't sure enough to recommend her endorsement by Blue America. She told me she backed the Green New Deal, banning the sale of assault weapons and Medicare-for-All, adding the caveat "for those who want it." I hoped all cycle she would see the light and that we could endorse her. Never happened. She lost to Leger Fernandez, despite outraising her significantly:

My friends in the state suggested Teresa Leger Fernandez was the progressive in the race but everything about her website screamed an identity politics, DCCC-EMILY's List nothing-candidate. There was no way to get in touch with her on the site-- usually a good indication a candidate is a corporate shill. There was no issues page, which is 100% pure DCCC-EMILY's List. And the website is just all about her, or her idea of how she wanted to present herself to voters. It was all "me! me! me!" and nothing about what she was supposedly offering the people in the district. Her intro video didn't say a damn thing about how she's likely to behave in Congress. Will she be like the 2 other New Mexico Reps, Deb Haaland, whose voting record is an "A" or like Xochitl Torres Small, whose voting record is an "F." I noted that "It makes a difference."

In their cheer-leadery election wrap-up on Wednesday, The Intercept found other results to cheer about in New Mexico.

In New Mexico, an all-women slate of progressives challenged five recalcitrant incumbents under the banner of a coalition dubbed “No Corporate Democrats.” Four of the five women ousted long-serving members of the state Senate who had stood in the way of the progressive agenda for years in this deep blue state. Another allied progressive, who wasn’t officially part of the coalition, unseated an anti-choice Democrat. The defeated incumbents include state Senate leadership figures.

Eric Griego, New Mexico state director for the Working Families Party, which had backed the progressives, said their victories are the “last gasp” of the moderate, corporate wing of the party on a state and local level. He noted that these victories build on the gains progressives made in the 2018 wave elections, when one of the longest-serving members of the state House of Representatives, conservative Democrat Debbie Rodella, was defeated by Susan Herrera.

“With them gone, we think this is going to open up a lot of really, really monumental legislation that the state has needed for generations,” Griego said. The progressives’ priorities include fully funding early childhood programs, releasing the state’s dependence on oil and gas, and repealing an arcane law that criminalizes abortion, he added. “The other really big one is potentially expanding the social safety net whether it’s healthcare or childhood education.”

An unprecedented number of absentee ballots has led to delays, so the votes are still being counted, but the Working Families Party declared victory in all five races Wednesday afternoon.

Siah Correa Hemphill, an educator and school psychologist, won overwhelmingly in District 28, unseating state Sen. Gabe Ramos. In District 38, Carrie Hamblen, a pioneer in New Mexico’s fight for LGBTQ rights and marriage equality, is locked in a tight race against Senate President Pro Tempore Mary Kay Papen. Ballots are still being counted in the extremely close race, with Hamblen leading by about 139 votes as of Wednesday afternoon.

In District 35, Neomi Martinez-Parra has a nearly 10 percentage point lead over state Sen. John Arthur Smith, who has been in office since 1989 and serves as the head of the Senate Finance Committee. Pam Cordova, a retired educator, also appears to be on track to victory, leading state Sen. Clemente Sanchez by over 1,000 votes, as of Wednesday morning. Cordova was backed by local labor groups and unions, EMILY’s List, and U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich.

Noreen Kelly, a Navajo elder and environmental activist who ran with No Corporate Democrats, is the only candidate on the slate who lost. She jumped in late in the race, formally launching in March, and struggled to get her campaign off the ground.

Leo Jaramillo, chair of the Rio Arriba County Commission, wasn’t officially on the No Corporate Democrat slate, but his victory is being celebrated by the Working Families Party and other allied progressive groups. Jaramillo defeated five-term incumbent state Sen. Richard Martinez, an anti-choice lawmaker who was also one of four Democrats to vote against New Mexico’s “red-flag” gun law, in District 5. The embattled state senator had faced calls to step down after being convicted and jailed for drunk driving last year. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham asked Martinez to resign from his seat, saying he was “obligated to reflect on his actions and how best to reconcile them with his position as a public servant in the state Legislature, in particular his status as chairman of an influential committee,” but no personal reckoning had taken place.

Oil and gas companies, which wield enormous influence over the state’s budget and politicians, pumped at least $1 million into New Mexico’s state Senate races, including Chevron Oil spending $700,000 in support of the incumbents. But some of the challengers, like Jaramillo and Correa Hemphill, had garnered broader coalitions of support across the progressive wing of the party and with top Democrats like Lujan Grisham and Heinrich. To help boost the candidates, the WFP joined other groups in making tens of thousands of calls, sending out mail, and investing in radio and texting.

The No Corporate Democrats coalition was modeled after New York’s No IDC coalition, which in 2018 unseated conservative Democrats who were allied with Republicans, known as the Independent Democratic Conference. Progressives in New Mexico were tasked with the challenge of branding incumbents that work with Republicans, Griego said. Despite pushing candidates in a few risky, tough races, the coalition, which included reproductive rights groups, environmental groups, and the nonprofit organization OLÉ, pulled it off.

Good! Meanwhile New Mexico will send a less progressive/more establishment delegation to DC next year--just one progressive (Haaland) out of the 5, which includes a very conservative Blue Dog and, mostly, careerist politicians who don't do much-- neither good nor bad-- for their communities. Replacing the most progressive member, Senator Tom Udall, will be a big zero-- Ben Ray, a complete waste of a Senate seat-- and exactly what Schumer demanded. I suppose that's the best most Americans can hope for from the elected leaders.