The headline of this report “New Mexico education documents for high school history and ethnic studies include climate change, intersectionality, and ‘January 6 insurrection’” offers a brutal takedown of the left wing indoctrination going on in New Mexico schools.

The report summary states “The New Mexico Public Education Department’s (NMPED) Instructional Scope (NMIS) documents for High School History and Ethnic studies feature content such as climate change, gender identity, intersectionality, power and privilege, the “Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” the “January 6 insurrection,” and leftwing groups such as Black Lives Matter, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), GLAAD, and Sunrise Movement. The NMIS also focuses on social justice movements including the “2020 racial justice protests,” “#MeToo movement,” and Indigenous Environmentalism.

You can bet that none of what is happening in New Mexico classrooms involves a critical analysis of each of these issues. The recently-discredited SPLC is hardly the kind of organization one should be studying in high school except as a case study of a scam. The same can be said for numerous other groups cited in the report.

Back during the time between 2021-2023 the Rio Grande Foundation testified and worked to get our fellow New Mexicans engaged in the fight against these “woke” standards. Others did the same. But, Gov. MLG wanted them and rammed them through.

Don’t worry, New Mexico is still 52nd in education and has the lowest literacy rate in the nation, but we are pleased to report that the students ARE being duly indoctrinated in left wing agendas. It also happens to be the 250th celebration of the American Founding. Sadly, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson don’t seem to play a role in these standards at all.

In a classic case of creating a problem only to now be concerned about the fallout of that problem, according to the Albuquerque Journal Gov. MLG has created a state energy council to study cost, reliability issues involved in New Mexico’s electricity grid. Furthermore, according to the article, “The 13-member council, which includes Cabinet secretaries and industry executives, will be tasked with studying how the state’s electrical grid can be updated while protecting ratepayers from cost increases.” As the Journal noted, “New Mexicans (are) facing rising electricity rates.”

This is exactly the opposite of what supporters promised from the ETA. The Gov. and numerous environmental groups claimed at the time and continue to claim that New Mexicans would benefit from lower costs.

If the Council doesn’t begin and end with a discussion of repealing the Gov.’s “Energy Transition Act” (ETA) of 2019 then it really isn’t worth convening in the first place. In fact, the Council should simply gather, pass a resolution stating that the Legislature should repeal the ETA and bring both natural gas AND nuclear into New Mexico’s long-term electricity mix (these two sources are not supported by the Act which mandates 80% renewable energy by 2040 and  100% zero carbon resources by 2045 for traditional utilities like PNM.

Until 2024 PNM had leases with Palo Verde nuclear plant in Arizona. Those agreements were ended thanks to the ETA in favor of solar and batteries.

The Rio Grande Foundation opposed and worked to stop the Energy Transition Act back and 2019 and we have continued to oppose it while calling out reliability and cost concerns. If we could make one other recommendation to the Gov. and this Council San Juan County where the San Juan Generating Station was (until recently) located would be a great location for a few natural gas plants.

On this week’s conversation Paul and Wally discuss:

New Mexico expected to see dramatic declines in K-12 enrollment.

In a bit of breaking news Rep. Rebecca Dow has been restored to the ballot by New Mexico’s Supreme Court.

In other news relating to NM’s Supreme Court the Court unanimously allowed Otero County ICE Contract to move forward.

Bernalillo County Assessor Damian Lara seems to be selling himself w/ our tax dollars.

New Mexico ranks 35th in Rich States Poor States. What does this ranking include? How does NM’s current 35th ranking compare with past editions of this report?

Virgin Galactic says they still plan to start flying later this year.

The Rio Grande Foundation has been highlighting the challenge facing New Mexico with regard to the State’s loss of young people. The largest district (APS) has lost 27,000 students in the past 15 years. If the situation is bad in urban areas one can only imagine what rural communities are dealing with. We only need to look as far as San Jon’s planned new school building for details. San Jon is on the Texas border off I-40.

According to the article linked above the District is currently looking to build a brand new 55,000 sq ft school building for District’s 112 students from prekindergarten through 12th grade. This is obviously an extremely rural community with very little in the way of population or jobs. Notably, the article notes that the District went from 117 students last year to 112 this year. That may sound like a trivial decline, but it is a drop of 4.7% in a single year. We found data from 2014-2015 showing the district had a student population of 145. That’s a 23% drop in 11 years.

This is NOT to “pick on” San Jon schools or even to say that they shouldn’t have a new building. Of course, one wonders why New Mexico needs 89 school districts (not including charter schools). The fact that the money for this project is coming from the State, not local resources is one serious issue. As long as local districts receive such subsidies from the state (courtesy of the oil and gas industry) they don’t need to concern themselves with building a local economy to pay for things like schools.

Usually this is the point where we propose some solutions, but it’s not an easy situation.

• New Mexico clearly has too many school districts;
• Our student population is plummeting especially in the non-oil and gas rural areas;
• Our education funding formula and concentration of $$ in Santa Fe creates political incentives to
• Our school construction costs are very expensive due to everything from lack of modular building plans to LEED design and Davis-Bacon rules;
• Innovative solutions are necessary, but New Mexico’s politicians have no interest in addressing the situation when oil and gas money keeps flowing.

After years of overspending the City of Las Cruces, like Albuquerque, faces a budget deficit. There is a lot to unpack with the situation in Las Cruces. For starters, unlike Albuquerque which has lost people, Las Cruces continues to grow and has seen a 7.08% increase since the 2020 census. That means that the City can and should be able to grow its budget albeit at a reasonable and steady pace. Unfortunately, it looks like the City has overshot the mark:

• FY24: The city approved a $519 million budget, which at the time was the largest in city history, with a 9.4% increase in the general fund.
• FY25: The city adopted a $596 million budget that added 21 new positions and increased personnel spending by $10.2 million.
• The FY 26 budget was $612.2 million.

In other words, in just the span of three years Las Cruces spending rose by 18%. 

The good news is that tax hikes do not seem to be part of the conversation at this point. 

While cities should definitely be more financially responsible, it is also true that Albuquerque and Las Cruces don’t benefit in the same way as the State does from New Mexico’s oil and gas boom. There HAS to be a way for the State to leverage some of the piles of cash it has to push cities to go along with much-needed reforms to the State’s broken and anti-business gross receipts tax. Some of us remember in 2023 when bipartisan reform legislation with MLG’s support was killed due to lobbying from cities that would have taken a trivial budget cut from lost GRT revenues in the proposed reform. A governor and legislature that cared about making needed tax reforms to grow New Mexico economically would prioritize innovative ways to bring these and the rest of New Mexico’s cities on board with needed tax reforms.

While New Mexico continues to spend more every year on K-12 education we have documented the fact that the number of kids being educated in New Mexico’s largest district and the state as a whole have been plummeting.  But, as we also noted, this trend of declining numbers of children/youth is only getting started. And, while demography is going to be a serious challenge throughout developed economies worldwide, the reality here in the United States is that population shifts are not distributed evenly.

In fact, despite great weather and being located in the American Southwest (a fast growing part of the US), according to a new report from Bellwether, New Mexico is going to see the 3rd-steepest decline in its K-12 population between now and FY 2031. With a projected drop of 15.1 percent New Mexico’s student population decline trails only deep blue (politically) states Hawaii and California.

Other neighboring states (with the exception of Colorado) are either growing or holding steady in terms of the number of young people. But, the steep drop in New Mexico’s youth population has not elicited much of a response at all from the media or the State’s political leadership.

1. New Mexico’s education spending both per-pupil and in real terms has grown even while the student population has declined. How much more will New Mexico spend on K-12 at a time of declining enrollment?
2. Under the current Gov. the State has embraced “free” childcare, “free” pre-K, and “free” college. Will any of these “move the needle” in terms of the number of students?
3. While population trends  overall are heading down, why is New Mexico seeing such stark declines? What policies could actually move the needle?

Yesterday, the New Mexico Supreme Court decided that HB 9 the so-called “Immigrant Safety Act” which passed during the last legislative session, cannot be used to prevent the agreement between Otero County and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The law, which goes into effect May 20 states, “A public body that is a party to an existing agreement that is used to detain individuals for federal civil immigration violations shall, upon the effective date of the Immigrant Safety Act, terminate the agreement upon the earliest date permissible under the terms of the agreement, with respect to all provisions that relate to the detention of individuals for federal civil immigration violations.”

1. You can bet that AG Raul Torrez is going to attempt to find a way to argue that “the earliest date permissible” is May 20.
2. The order was issued summarily, without explanation meaning that the legal arguments backing their decision were not outlined. But, it would seem that the law’s effective date (which won’t happen for another month) is critical.

The point is that this legal saga is by no means over. Even though these facilities employ 1,000 New Mexicans and have significant implications for local/state economies this is such a hot-button issue for Democrats that it is unlikely the AG and other Democrats will simply give up. Keep an eye out come May 20. More details from the Santa Fe New Mexican.

County Assessor is usually a pretty obscure elected office. Do you know your county assessor’s name without checking? Being that the individual is in charge of assessing and collecting property taxes it is not a great springboard to higher office.

But the current Assessor Damian Lara seems to be trying and he’s not shy about using taxpayer dollars to raise his profile. See the Albuquerque Journal (April 16, 2026) edition below. Along with Lara’s smiling face he touts various property tax exemptions that you may be eligible for. In some billboards and other advertisements around town he always has his photo prominently displayed. Some of them make it seem (they allude, but don’t necessarily state) that Lara is the one responsible for these tax breaks (the Legislature is the one responsible). It may not be illegal for elected officials to display their face and name prominently on taxpayer-funded information, but it is definitely questionable. We are working to find out how much and from what pool of money he has accessed funds for these advertisements.

Even notoriously corrupt former Gov. Bill Richardson had the decency NOT to include his picture on those (GRIP) Governor Richardson Investment Project) road signs back in his day. 

Lara has certainly not been shy about advancing his policy agenda. He just developed a new policy forcing certain owners of AirBnB’s to pay higher taxes.  He’s also imposed higher tax rates on vacant commercial properties as a stick to push for the owner to sell or occupy the property.

You can go to the Assessor’s website which includes an AI chatbot with Lara offering to answer questions. The website includes a link to “Click to see the Assessor’s tax savings programs” which as noted above would lead many readers to believe that HE is the one providing the tax breaks.

On this week’s show Paul sits down with activist and independent candidate for Gov. Jacob Smith. Jacob was active in fighting anti-gun legislation (SB 17) in the 2026 legislative session. We discuss his activism, his plans for New Mexico, and why he’s running as an independent. Check out this great conversation!

Find Jacob’s campaign website here: https://www.smithfornm.com/

You can find his Twitter account here: @GovernToChange

The folks at American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) do an annual report called “Rich States, Poor States” in which they rank a number of economic policy factors as seen above. On the plus side New Mexico doesn’t rank dead last as it so often does. At a ranking of 35th we are definitely towards the bottom, but not as bad as usual.

On the flip side, New Mexico lags its neighbors by quite a bit in the rankings. Arizona is 5th, Utah 1, Colorado 29, Oklahoma 8th, and Texas is 13th. New Mexico lags behind at 35th. 

Finally, the following chart which was produced by RGF. Since a #1 ranking is better than 50th, it is better to be lower than higher on the chart below. New Mexico’s overall ranking has been rather stagnant in the 30s over the years.

It has been awhile since anything of importance happened with Virgin Galactic at Spaceport America. Back in August we discussed what we believe to be a deeply flawed economic “study” of the facility’s economic impact, but the company last launched on June 8, 2024 and we have been waiting for the company to resume its space tourism flights out of their taxpayer-funded New Mexico facility ever since.

Well, according to USA Today, the company is still planning to launch this year. (we have our doubts, but only time will tell). According to the article:

Virgin Galactic still expects to resume its space tourism operations by the end of 2026 as it looks to begin ground testing for its new spaceplane in April.

The commercial suborbital spaceflight company founded by billionaire Richard Branson hasn’t conducted a mission taking civilians to the edge of space in nearly two years. But in a recent earnings call, company leaders indicated that plans remain on track to resume those operations later this year now that its new suborbital spaceplane is in the final stages of assembly in Phoenix, Arizona.

Up next? testing from the ground before transitioning to the flight test phase in New Mexico.

Will the company really be able to go from ground testing to flight test and ultimately manned launches within the span of 8 months? They have certainly not hit ambitious targets like this one over the years. Time will tell, but this is one of MANY examples where New Mexico politicians have chased some BIG economic development dream by throwing tax dollars at it rather than making necessary reforms to make New Mexico a more attractive place to do business. The Spaceport and so many other big-spending policies/projects have either failed completely or had at best limited success.

The worst article you’ll see today was written by a New Mexico state Rep.

A new report finds that New Mexico is a disaster for families.

UNM offering a class on the fashion of singer “Bad Bunny.”

Paul and Wally take a “deep dive” look at 10 realities on taxes.

New Mexico ranked 4th heaviest in a Wallethub Tax burden report.

The Mayor of Albuquerque says his proposed budget is being cut. Here are further details along with comments from Councilor Dan Lewis.

KOB TV recently covered New Mexico’s plans for rail over the next 20 years. Along with that plan, Colorado’s Gov. Jared Polis announced a new “front range” passenger rail system that will connect Denver as far south as Trinidad.

So, the question is: What is New Mexico planning to do and how much is it going to cost? After all, far left Democrat Sen. Bill Soules has been pushing for high speed rail from Denver to Mexico (crossing NM North to South). This despite the fact that New Mexico’s current passenger rail system (the Railrunner) has seen ridership collapse and emits more CO2 than driving a car.

The good news is that New Mexico has no plans to join Colorado’s passenger rail plans. Also, the Rail Runner is not being considered for expansion though a Las Cruces/El Paso passenger line is at least discussed. That would certainly not be cheap but it is a long way from serious planning.

Perhaps more exciting and interesting is the plans for freight rail. Currently plans for (separate) rail spurs to San Juan and Lea counties are being considered as well as for the Santa Teresa border crossing. Those are all reasonable ways to build New Mexico’s transportation network. A spur to Spaceport America seems a bit wild considering the lack of action at that facility from the largest tenant Virgin Galactic.

Check out the full story here:

A policy blogger named Maria Davidson recently started posting a series of charts contrasting the growth in state spending vs the growth in the same state’s population over the past decade (one for California is linked). I asked for a New Mexico version of her chart, but none was forthcoming, so I made my own. But then I realized that growth over the past decade isn’t nearly as interesting as growth under the current Gov. MLG, so here we are.

But first we have to define what state spending actually means and it isn’t JUST the FY 2027 General Fund budget of $11.1 billion which has grown by 81% under the current Gov. However, with the oil and gas driven growth of New Mexico’s permanent funds and continued reliance on federal spending, New Mexico’s total budget is MUCH bigger than just the general fund.

How big? According to the National Association of State Budget Officers (NASBO), in FY 2019 MLG’s first budget was a robust $19.5 billion. That already large number has grown to $29.7 billion under MLG’s FY 2025 budget. In other words, New Mexico’s total spending has grown 52% under Lujan Grisham (excluding the last two fiscal years). See below

How’s New Mexico’s population doing? In 2019 using simple google searches it was 2,096,829. As of 2025 that number had grown to 2,136,838. That’s total growth of just 2.48%. Needless to say, New Mexico’s budget has grown massively under the current administration fueled by oil and gas revenues. This number will likely continue to grow rapidly in the years ahead driven partially by state expenditures from the permanent funds for pre-K and state-funded “free” childcare.

You can see the chart along with source data on both below:

I saw the following post from the Freakonomics Facebook page. And, since we are obsessed with economics here at the Rio Grande Foundation and Errors of Enchantment (but sometimes we need a change of pace from New Mexico’s failed policies) I’d like to take an opportunity to dissect this list:

1. Tax cuts generally do NOT pay for themselves. But, some tax cuts like reducing/eliminating the capital gains and corporate income tax ARE able to boost overall economic growth enough to repay a significant portion of the cut.
2. There is no evidence “starve the beast” works.
3. The rich in the US pay much MORE than their “fair” share.
4. Correct, loopholes and deductions eliminated much of the “bite” of the top income tax of years’ past. Worse, they were economically inefficient.
5. European middle and lower classes pay much higher taxes than Americans of similar incomes.
6. Spending and especially spending on Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid drive US budget deficits. 
7. NO, “taxing the rich” cannot balance the budget. Reforming so-called “entitlements” as seen in #6 is the only surefire way to balance the budget.
8. This one is somewhat contentious, but if you understand that the US tax code is already so “progressive” as to collect disproportionate revenues from “the rich” the TCJA contained many tax cuts for those at lower income levels. 
9. Correct, the tax code prior to 1980 was inefficient and anti-growth.
10. Currently, US corporate taxes are in line with international averages. In recent years they have been higher than in other countries.
11. 

According to a new report from Wallethub with the map below provided by Visual Capitalist, New Mexico has the 4th-heaviest tax burden in America at 10.8%. The Land of Enchantment burden ranks lower than only other ultra-blue states including Vermont, Hawaii, and New York.

The methodology involves taking property tax, income, and excise/sales tax burdens and measuring them a percentage of personal income. You can find the information for yourself here. For years the Rio Grande Foundation has worked to reduce New Mexico’s tax burdens, but Democrat Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and the “progressive” Legislature have preferred to spend the money or sock it away for future spending instead.

The Rio Grande Foundation has been very active in pushing Gov. Lujan Grisham to sign onto the $1,700 federal school choice tax credit contained in the federal “Big Beautiful Bill.” You can click here to read our post on that AND send the Gov. a note asking her to include New Mexico in the program. The Gov. after initially rejecting the plan has since insisted that she’ll make a decision once the regulations are written. That could take some time, but ultimately she’ll need to make a final decision before leaving office. You can see our recent writing with links to others here, but Democrat Rep. Raymundo (Rocky) Lara just had the weakest possible article published in the Santa Fe New Mexican attempting to convince MLG NOT to get New Mexico into the program.

Here’s the crux of his argument:

1. We don’t want “a fragmented system where funding is driven by individual preference rather than student need.” Simply put, why? “Individual preference” gets us what we want when it comes to food, cars, and housing. Why can’t that work in education. Oh, and New Mexico kids are suffering in the WORST schools in the NATION!
2. “In New Mexico, we have worked deliberately to build a funding system that prioritizes fairness.” Yes, that same system has given everyone access to the worst education system in the nation.
3. “They (public schools) are accountable to the communities they serve. How so?” The Yazzie v. Martinez case was decided because New Mexico’s schools were considered “inadequate.” The “solution” was to pour more money into the schools while students have fled the biggest district in New Mexico and the State’s schools as a whole. Shouldn’t “accountability” empower families rather than forcing them to home school, leave New Mexico, or pay (twice) for private school?

The chart below put together by Rio Grande Foundation highlights how Albuquerque’s budgets have grown under Mayor Tim Keller from: $997,720,000 during Keller’s first term to over $1.5 billion in the current 2026 fiscal year. Keller has proposed a modest reduction in spending for FY 2027 which is currently under consideration.

The City population has been stagnant over that time (around $560,000) while, if the budget had increased at the same rate as the Consumer Price Index would be closer to $1.3 billion, not in excess of $1.5 billion. Keller’s latest budget would see a slight drop in spending to $1.47 billion. Keller has said he plans to eliminate 247 positions with the City to cut the $35 million needed due to slower revenue growth.

A chart illustrating the growth in City of Albuquerque spending can be found below.

There is plenty of wasteful at the City starting with the outrageous $10 million/mile bike trail. 

Free buses are another issue. So is out-of-control spending on the homeless which hasn’t made a dent in the problem. The proposed FY27 budget would increase funding by 9.5% to $48.9 million for the city’s Health, Housing and Homelessness Department. Homeless is widely considered to have worsened dramatically under Keller with a doubling in the population. 

The remodel of City Hall is yet another project that has grown overbudget and the book about COVID in Albuquerque while small in amount only highlights the ridiculous spending at the City.

UPDATE: We received the following from ABQ City Councilor Dan Lewis: “The Mayor’s budget shows a 2.7% increase in revenue year over year, yet spending all of it. There is no spending cut. We are spending more than the year before. The decrease in revenue was from some shell game adjusting to aviation and other departments of revenue that’s not there and never was.

They eliminated 247 untilled positions that were never going to be hired in the first place but always budget for, and then added 80 positions – s0 net -167. Again, no reduction in revenue or spending. This is a Mayor that raises taxes, raises fees, spends every penny, and has nothing to show for it. Most of the increased spending goes to Health, Housing & Homelessness for failed housing programs.”

On this week’s interview Paul talks to Neeraja Deshpande, policy analyst at Independent Women. Among other things they discuss her latest op-ed on the New Mexico education crisis in The Daily Wire. The piece comes on the heels of Independent Women’s Features documentary: Give Teachers a Break: The Hidden Crisis Inside New Mexico’s Classrooms. In the documentary,  a veteran school teacher gives a breakdown on just how bad it has gotten: chronic absenteeism, affirming gender ideology to kids as young as five, and deep-seated behavioral issues are just the tip of the iceberg.

Neeraja Deshpande is:

• Former middle and high school math, English, and financial literacy teacher
• Author of Independent Women’s latest report: “Give Teachers a Break”, which was featured in an article in American Family News
• Featured in RealClear Education, The Daily Wire, The Federalist, The Hill, and other national publications for her work on education reform

Don’t miss this important conversation about what is taking place in New Mexico classrooms.

Michelle Lujan Grisham and many Democrats in New Mexico’s Legislature seem to believe that the best way to support families is more government handouts. As part of their “cradle to career” agenda we’ve seen the establishment of taxpayer-funded “free” childcare, pre-K, and college and massive increases in K-12 spending as well.

But are these government programs enough to “move the needle” and make New Mexico a better place for families? Not so much. For exhibit A you need look no further than the NM DoJ’s recent report detailing myriad failings at CYFD. You can watch an hour long press conference of AG Raul Torrez announcing his lawsuit against CYFD and the agency’s myriad failings.

We’d ALSO recommend a new report from the Institute for Family Studies. Sadly, the report (as so many do) ranked New Mexico dead last and it isn’t particularly close. The report uses  a composite measure of three variables: the share of adults ages 25 to 54 who are married, the share of teens living with married parents, and the total fertility rate. 

The key chart associated with the report can be seen below with the following quote from the report explaining the situation: “New Mexico ranks last in the 2026 Family Structure Index. In many low-ranking states, low levels of religion, a tradition of family instability, low education, or a high cost of living are associated with scoring lower on one or more measures of the FSI.”

It is worth noting that while government policy can’t improve upon ALL of these issues it CAN move them in a positive (or negative) direction. Once the child winds up with CYFD it is almost always due to one or more family failures. More government programs are simply not likely to improve ANY of these issues and thus are doomed to fail while spending untold sums of taxpayer dollars.

On this week’s Tipping Point conversation Paul and Wally discussed the defeat of ranked choice voting at Albuquerque City Council the evening before and the role RGF played in the victory.

As president of the Rio Grande Foundation and having been in New Mexico for 20 years (albeit having grown up elsewhere) one of the most infuriating things about New Mexico politics is the undue emphasis on being a “native New Mexican.” That said, Deb Haaland has played the game and touted her being a “35th generation” New Mexican. And indeed she is an enrolled member of Laguna Pueblo.

But, as Sean Davis of The Federalist points out, she was actually born in Winslow, AZ to parents who were ALSO not born in New Mexico (he actually was and RGF’s president knew Davis when both worked on Capitol Hill).  Does it MATTER that Deb Haaland wasn’t born in New Mexico? Quite frankly, we don’t think so. The election for New Mexico SHOULD be on policies and ideas for moving New Mexico forward, not past events that were simply not under the control of the person seeking the office.

But, on the flip side, people like Deb Haaland should also be campaigning on her vision for New Mexico, not her “New Mexico” lineage.

Speaking of New Mexico, and setting your constitutional and historical illiteracy aside, given that neither you (AZ), nor your mother (AZ), nor your father (MN) were born in New Mexico, why do you falsely claim to be a “35th-generation New Mexican?”

Kinda weird to get all high… https://t.co/d6qJg5W08z pic.twitter.com/NQksMOZ4t1

— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) April 2, 2026

Recently, we wrote a post in which we outlined how Gov. Lujan Grisham seems to be willing to consider joining the federal school choice tax credit program set up in 2025 under President Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill.” Although not ALL details are confirmed the tax credit is $1,700 and could be used for various schools of choice.

GOP Rep. Rebecca Dow recently sent a letter to Lujan Grisham in which she laid out a compelling case in support of New Mexico participating in the law.

The Albuquerque Journal covered that and quoted the unions in opposition (no surprise there):

Whitney Holland, the president of the American Federation of Teachers union in New Mexico, said this week she was planning to reach out to the Lujan Grisham administration with information from the national union.

“From our point of view, it’s a disastrous program,” said Holland, who said the federal program could specifically disenfranchise students in rural New Mexico communities that lack school choice options.

This opposition is rich considering that the US Department of Education amounts to just 4% of the federal budget and less than half of that money even goes to K-12 education. That’s because most education funding is done at the state, not federal level. The unions don’t like ANY competition at all because they and their politician friends in New Mexico have destroyed the education system  and don’t want to see ANY competition or way out.

Finally, Rep. Dow, RGF, and other education advocates are NOT alone. The Catholic Archbishops of New Mexico recently sent the following letter to the Gov. advocating in support of the tax credit. MLG is a graduate of St. Michael’s HS in Santa Fe (a Catholic School). Yet, while benefitting personally from a Catholic education she has been allied with the unions throughout her time in office leading New Mexico to its abysmal 52nd ranking in the NAEP. On the other hand, if Catholic schools were considered a state, they would rank first in the nation in NAEP reading and math for 4th and 8th graders. 

You can send the Gov. a letter of support for the program here.