Governor: Legislature should be 'embarrassed' after rejecting her special session agenda

Jul. 18—SANTA FE — Five hours and no action on her crime-related agenda.

The outcome of a special session prompted fiery criticism from Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, who called Thursday one of the most disappointing days of her career.

"The Legislature as a body walked away from their most important responsibility: keeping New Mexicans safe," Lujan Grisham said in a statement.

"The Legislature should be embarrassed at their inability to summon even an ounce of courage to adopt common-sense legislation to make New Mexicans safer," the governor added. "For those of you who go home to the sound of gunshots, who see hypodermic needles in your parks, and the families desperate to get a loved one living on the street the help they deserve, I'm sorry that most of our elected officials didn't even try."

The Democratic governor, who is barred under the state Constitution from seeking another term in 2026, had urged legislators to pass a package of bills that she said would improve public safety.

Before the special session started, she left the door open to calling lawmakers back to Santa Fe again if they ignored her proposed bills.

The Governor's Office did not immediately respond to questions late Thursday about whether an additional special session might be in the works.

Meanwhile, the public disagreement between Lujan Grisham and Democratic lawmakers could lead to lingering animosity over the final two-plus years of her term in office.

Leading Democratic legislators had questioned whether her bills would actually reduce crime rates and said they were not crafted with input from mental health advocates and other impacted populations.

They said Thursday they were hopeful of mending relations, but defended their handling of the special session.

"It's important to understand we are equal branches of government," said Senate Majority Leader Peter Wirth, D-Santa Fe.

Senate President Pro Tem Mimi Stewart, an Albuquerque Democrat, acknowledged concerns about the special session's political fallout, saying, "We hope the temperature calms down and we are talking more to each other."

Special session marks new approach

The governor's decision to forge ahead on the special session without an agreement in place with most lawmakers appeared to be at odds with her past approach.

Amid urging last year from some Republican lawmakers to call a special session on child welfare issues, the governor said she generally opposes using such sessions as a "tool to force issues that we don't have good collaboration on."

The Governor's Office also rebuffed then-House Speaker Brian Egolf's call for a special session on domestic terrorism in 2019, after a gunman killed 23 people in El Paso in a racist attack.

Rep. Christine Chandler, D-Los Alamos, told the Journal the session went as expected.

"It did not seem the best use of anyone's time to go through the motions when we understood that (the governor's bills) wouldn't be able to get through," she said.

Chandler said if the governor calls another special session, lawmakers will show up per their constitutional duty.

"It's unfortunate that she's not thinking about a way to collaborate, and I think iterations of calling sessions is not the best way to build sufficient goodwill to come to consensus on bills," she said.

House Minority Leader Rod Montoya, R-Farmington, said he did not want the outcome of the special session to be misconstrued as all lawmakers brushing off the governor's agenda.

He blamed progressive Democrats pushing for crime bills that aren't holding people accountable.

To voters, he said, "If you actually want us to address crime, elect candidates that will take crime serious."

For her part, the governor noted that Republicans would have passed many or all of the public safety bills on her agenda, but Democrats blocked the efforts.

Political fallout could reverberate

The special session was called in a year when all 112 lawmakers are up for reelection, a fact not lost on the governor or legislators.

Lujan Grisham said the Legislature showed during Thursday's special session that "it has no interest in making New Mexico safer."

The governor also touted the support of numerous police chiefs, mayors and tribal leaders from around the state, some of whom traveled to Santa Fe this week to back the governor's agenda.

But the governor's crime-related agenda drew fierce pushback from other traditional allies, as a coalition of advocacy groups opposed the measures and argued they could be harmful to vulnerable state residents.

Nayomi Valdez, public policy director at the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico, applauded lawmakers for taking a cautious approach to complex issues.

"We are grateful to see the legislators, who were elected to represent the communities they live in, do the right thing today," Valdez said. "Providers, advocates, and lawmakers agreed that New Mexicans deserve real solutions, not political theater."

However, the debate over crime is expected to continue in a state that had the nation's highest violent crime rate in 2022, according to FBI data.

One lawmaker, Sen. Crystal Brantley, R-Elephant Butte, said she awoke at her Santa Fe rental property Thursday morning to find her car had been vandalized.

The stolen items included a handgun, Brantley said, which she added underscored the need for lawmakers to take crime-related issues more seriously.

"It's not an Albuquerque problem," she said. "We're seeing an increase in violent crime ... all over New Mexico."