In the wake of Gov. Lujan Grisham’s State of the State address, Republican House Minority Leader State Rep. Jim Townsend, said that during the speech he thought the governor “almost became a Republican.” He’s not wrong.

After three full years and legislative sessions (not to mention multiple special sessions and the constant invocation of her “emergency” powers) of governing as a hard left “progressive,” the Gov. seems to be tacking to the center in advance of her reelection bid this fall. This may be both good policy as well as good politics.

Specifically, in her State of the State address Lujan Grisham announced that she wants New Mexico to stop taxing Social Security. New Mexico is one of just 13 states in the nation to do this and bi-partisan efforts have been made in recent years to eliminate or vastly reduce the tax.

Her support for repeal is welcome, but many “progressives” in her own party seem skeptical. As of this writing one Social Security tax repeal failed on a tie vote in the House Labor Committee. Only one Democrat and three Republicans endorsed the idea. So, Social Security tax repeal is by no means a “done deal.”

This is true even though the state has plenty of money, as evidenced by the Gov.’s ambitious budget which contains a 13.5% spending increase over last year. The $80 million or so in “lost” revenue from ending the tax is a drop in the bucket when compared with the flood of new revenues. This is a flood that seems likely to continue with high oil prices and record production in the Permian Basin. So, New Mexico has plenty of money to cut taxes. In fact, the Gov. and Legislature should be looking for ways to use this flood of new money to both cut and reform taxes in ways that help diversify the economy.

While the decision to eliminate the Social Security tax is welcome, this is not the first time the Gov. has had a large surplus (or budget increase) available. In her first year in office (2019) the budget grew by 11 percent while increasing several taxes including taxes on car sales and hospitals. Bipartisan Social Security tax elimination bills have repeatedly been proposed since then. It certainly seems like the Gov.’s decision has a heavy dose of election year politics. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it is worth noting.

To her credit, the Gov. seems inclined to eliminate the Social Security tax without raising other taxes as one bill introduced this session would do. With the kind of money available, it is hard to justify raising taxes to make up for the small loss of revenue. Worse, a “revenue neutral” bill, introduced by Sen. Bill Tallman, would increase regressive tobacco taxes to make up for “lost” revenue.

Eliminating Social Security taxation should be a straight tax cut for the benefit of New Mexico seniors and those who might consider moving to New Mexico but see our State as “unwelcoming” for retirees due to our tax policies.

This legislative session is indeed an opportunity for the Legislature to “be bold” by enacting transformative policy changes. Reforming the broken gross receipts tax to eliminate taxation of services remains the very best way to do that. However, eliminating an unnecessary tax that makes New Mexico unattractive as a retirement destination is a worthwhile goal and we are hoping for the best and stand ready to support proponents of Social Security tax repeal this session.

Paul Gessing is president of New Mexico’s Rio Grande Foundation. The Rio Grande Foundation is an independent, nonpartisan, tax-exempt research and educational organization dedicated to promoting prosperity for New Mexico based on principles of limited government, economic freedom and individual responsibility

Perhaps you saw a silly new study claiming your gas stove is leaking methane like a sieve and causing health problems in YOUR home. During 2021 the Rio Grande Foundation debated with New Mexico Sen. Martin Heinrich (in both national and state publications) the merits and considerable demerits of his plan to “electrify” homes in the USA by eliminating natural gas appliances.

Unfortunately, like so much that passes for “science” these days, reality could not be further from the truth. Energy In Depth just published a debunking of the study here.

• • The researchers told Energy & Environment News that these supposedly massive gas leaks could be happening in homes without residents knowing it because methane doesn’t have an odor. Except it does, because by law it is required to before it’s sent to consumers. Utilities add mercaptan to give it that rotten eggs smell, so people can get out of the house if they smell it. If these “experts” don’t know that natural gas in homes has a distinct odor, how can we trust what they’re saying about allegedly leaking natural gas in homes?
  • Their health claim is based on comparing a single reading over a few minutes to a 1-hour outdoor air quality standard (NAAQS). The NAAQS is an average, so doing that is inappropriate. A study released last year on this same topic called out a separate research team for doing that and making the same kind of dubious health claims against gas;
  • To get their results, the researchers encased the kitchen area in plastic. In other words, there was no ventilation whatsoever. No kitchen anywhere is set up like this! They had to purposely envelop the gases in order to suggest there are problems;
  • One of the study’s authors told NPR that to fix the leaks you should go electric, but if you can’t then you should “Pull the stove out from the wall and tighten the connectors to the stove and to the nearby pipes.” This is insane, and once again reflects a lack of knowledge of what they actually studied. Only a licensed professional should ever do this, unless you have a death wish.
    

Gov. Lujan Grisham has proposed a 13.5 percent increase this year. While ALL states have received massive bailouts in the form of printed money from Washington, New Mexico’s financial windfall is largely generated by the oil and (to a lesser extent) gas industry.

On this week’s interview, Paul sits down with Albuquerque Public Schools board member Peggy Muller Aragon. Peggy has been a lone conservative voice on the APS school board, but recently gained some support from a group of more conservative/parent-focused board members. Paul and Peggy talk mask mandates and the latest round of restrictions being imposed on students through the Public Education Department. They discuss what the Board can do about it and what Paul WANTS the Board to do which is to reject ALL forms of masks and “social distancing” immediately.

The two go on to discuss the Sheryl Williams Stapleton situation, new social studies standards, and the use of National Guard (and the Gov. herself) as substitute teachers at this time of need. You don’t want to miss this important conversation.

The Senate Tax, Business, and Transportation Committee is holding a hearing today on SB 14, the Clean Fuel Standard. If adopted, this legislation will result in significant increases in the price of gasoline (starting off at 35 cents per gallon). The hearing which is expected to start sometime around 1:30pm can be watched on Zoom: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84895112616

But, NOW is the time to contact your legislators and tell them you oppose this awful bill which would dramatically increase gas prices at a time of already-high prices. Here is an RGF write-up on the issue.

Here are the members of the committee with email addresses (we have removed member names in order to make cut and paste easier):

UPDATE: The committee passed this bill. Stay tuned for more.

benny.shendo@nmlegis.gov

carrie.hamblen@nmlegis.gov

gay.kernan@nmlegis.gov

senatorbrandt@gmail.com

griggsholdings2@gmail.com

martin.hickey@nmlegis.gov

leo.jaramillo@nmlegis.gov

jas4nm@gmail.com

bill.tallman@nmlegis.gov

peter.wirth@nmlegis.gov

Normally we wouldn’t make an entire post about a single tweet, but when Gov. Lujan Grisham claims, as she did in her latest budget, that “This administration has created more jobs during the pandemic than the prior administration created in eight years – roughly 40,000 in the last year alone,” and you simply can’t find the same data, this kind of thing is interesting.

Notably, Susana Martinez was New Mexico’s Gov. from January of 2011 until December of 2018. For some reason Witmer arbitrarily omits the first two years of Martinez’s term. She is even more blatant in manipulating Lujan Grisham’s as she begins in April 2020 at the peak of the COVID panic. See the chart below her Tweet to see the FULL jobs picture.

For a few years the Rio Grande Foundation had hosted its web presence using the popular “GoDaddy” web hosting service. But in September of 2021 GoDaddy announced that it was going to be forcing the group Texas Right to Life off of its servers for the sin of collecting “tips” under Texas’ new abortion law.

The Rio Grande Foundation as an organization does not work on abortion issues and does not take a position on the Texas abortion law, but we DO have serious concerns about corporations and their newfound desire to “cancel” organizations and people with whom they may disagree. In fact, Rio Grande Foundation was recently censored by the video hosting platform Youtube. Thus, we have created a new channel on Rumble and will be putting our videos there as well.

The problems of “cancel culture” and censorship are by no means limited to “GoDaddy” (or Youtube) but we will push back wherever possible.  The Rio Grande Foundation often takes controversial stances on important public policy issues that could cause us to suddenly lose our web hosting service for some heretofore unforeseen reason.

Thankfully, we won’t have to worry about that in the future. As of today we have found another web hosting service and have removed our websites from GoDaddy.

On this week’s podcast interview Paul sits down with Albuquerque City Councilor Dan Lewis. They discuss the big changes that happened last election and what it means for Albuquerque. They talk about some of the major issues facing New Mexico’s largest city including crime, homelessness, and the need to lower taxes and make the City a better place to do business.

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Despite there being A LOT of bad bills in the 2022 session even with only 30 days to consider them, there ARE some good bills. Here are some of the BEST bills introduced so far. We’ll also “handicap” the likelihood that each bill will pass:

HB 40/HJR 3: Reps. Greg Nibert (R), Daymon Ely (D), Randall T. Pettigrew (R), Stefani Lord (R), and Rachel A. Black (R). This bill/amendment would place limits on the Governor (whoever that may be) and give the Legislature a “seat at the table” in future emergencies. Unfortunately, while similar bills were introduced in the 2021 session which lasted 60 days and a recent special session, this worthwhile bill which has bipartisan sponsorship has a LOW chance of passage.

HB 48/HB 49/SB 108 These bills introduced by Reps. Gail Armstrong (R), Cathrynn N. Brown (R), Randall T. Pettigrew (R) , Candie G. Sweetser (D), Rebecca Dow (R), and Sen. Padilla (D) would end taxation of Social Security under New Mexico’s personal income tax. This issue has been around for a few years, but Gov. Lujan Grisham has said that she supports eliminating the tax. We don’t know EXACTLY what she means (like if she’ll raise other taxes to do it), but these bills DO NOT offset the tax with new taxes. MODERATE chance of passage.

HB 76/SB 85  Reps. Phelps Anderson (I),  Harry Garcia (D)
T. Ryan Lane (R), Joy Garratt (D), Jane E. Powdrell-Culbert (R), and Sen. Harold Pope (D) would give a $30,000 exemption for military pensions. This bill is a worthy follow-up to the Social Security discussion, especially with New Mexico’s large number of ex-military. But, it is unlikely to happen this year. 

HB 91: Reps. Rebecca Dow (R),  Luis M. Terrazas (R),  James G. Townsend (R),  Candy Spence Ezzell, (R), and  Randall T. Pettigrew would prohibit the teaching of Critical Race Theory in New Mexico schools. It is unlikely to pass this year.

HJR 11: Reps. James G. Townsend (R), Ryan Lane (R), Larry Scott (R), Rod Montoya, (R), and Stefani Lord (R) would amend New Mexico’s constitution to specifically allow school funding to flow to families to choose the education option that makes sense for them which may include private schools or home school. Zero Chance of Passage until the unions no longer control New Mexico’s Legislature and Gov.

SB 5: Sen. Bobby Gonzalez (D), reduces the Gross Receipts Tax rate imposed by the State of New Mexico from 5.125% to 4.875 percent. This WAS a top priority of the Gov. prior to the session, but when she asked the Legislature to eliminate the Social Security tax in her State of the State address she seemed to shift emphasis away from reducing GRT rates. We still believe this has a High Chance of Passage.

As has been widely reported in the media, Albuquerque Public Schools on Wednesday, introduced a whole host of restrictions on various activities at their schools.

Here’s a list of the new rules:

• Wearing properly fitted masks outdoors as well as indoors
• Students facing one way in classrooms and the cafeteria
• Keeping students in cohorts
• No spectators at school events, including athletics, through Feb. 2
• Prohibiting large group gatherings, including assemblies
• Staggering transition times and recesses
• Closing drinking fountains (though students can still fill water bottles)
• Restricting locker use.

Needless to say, not only is the RGF not a fan of several of these measures (masking outdoors?) but at the VERY least we believe that the new APS Board should be making these policies, NOT the superintendent  or any unelected bureaucrat. Board member Peggy Mueller-Aragon motioned for a vote on the new rules to be placed on the Board’s agenda at their next meeting which will be in two weeks. We will be keeping an eye on this.

So, here are RGF president’s Paul Gessing’s comments:

I was very happy to see the changes made to the board in the last election and I hope you will act quickly to wrest control over the District away from the bureaucrats.

I am the parent of three children who, up until the end of the abbreviated 2019-2020 school year, attended Chaparral Elementary on Albuquerque’s west side. We pulled our children out of APS for the 2020-2021 “virtual” school year and home schooled them because we knew that they would receive a vastly inferior education. Numerous studies have proven us correct.

Now our three kids go to a charter school OR Catholic school because APS has been completely inept in managing COVID and balancing the learning and socialization needs of children with a virus that has minimal impacts on children and has for the past two years.

The new COVID protocols at APS, adopted (so far as I can tell) without a vote of the Board, are unfair, unnecessary, and unscientific. I urge the board to take a public vote to overturn them and I urge ALL board members to vote to do so. Furthermore, in addition to overturning the new, unnecessary protocols, I urge the NEW APS board to eliminate the unnecessary mask mandate on children in the classroom.

Albuquerque’s prior City Council (not the recently-elected group) collaborated with Mayor Keller to eliminate fares for bus riders. It is hard to say whether the new policy will result in more ridership or not, but it is clear that fewer and fewer people choose to ride the bus.

In the private sector this would result in resources being shifted away from an increasingly unpopular system. In government, failure results in more resources being wasted to provide a service that fewer people desire. Finally, the better option would be to return money wasted on “free” buses to taxpayers. 

Here is the data from the City with the percent of decrease added:

On this week’s podcast Paul and Wally begin by noting that the Foundation’s recent interview with Dr. Deane Waldman was censored by Youtube. The Foundation is currently working to find another video hosting site to host interviews and discussions.

A new report from Yahoo News via the London Telegraph indicates COVID was both man-made AND leaked from a lab and Fauci lied about it.

MLG Cancels MLK parade due to COVID, but Comicon goes on as scheduled at the ABQ Convention Center.

Local Christian (private) school, Hope Christian, fined $5,000 by NM PED for not enforcing masks on students.

Novak Djokovic story just keeps getting more bizarre: he won’t play in Australian Open and has been deported. Now a new law in France may keep him out of the French Open:

SCOTUS denies Biden’s sweeping vaccine mandate on businesses (6-3), but the court allowed a more limited mandate requiring health care workers at facilities receiving federal money to be vaccinated. The vote in the employer mandate case was 6 to 3, with the liberal justices in dissent. The vote in the health care case was 5 to 4, with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh joins the liberal justices to form a majority.

Despite far more restrictive policies New Mexico now exceeds both South Dakota AND (soon) Florida on COVID deaths per population. Here is the latest tally from World o Meters. 

Albuquerque Public Schools cancels classes due to a cyberattack. Another bad look for APS. Will APS get back to school on Tuesday? Bernalillo County ALSO suffered from a major cyber-attack recently and Santa Fe Public Schools have canceled in-person learning for the time being.

Councilor Dan Lewis proposes cutting Albuquerque GRT. That’s triple the tax cut proposed by MLG. 

Eliminate New Mexico’s Social Security tax, don’t shift the burden. Paul has put together an early list of the worst bills. These were pre-filed in the 2022 session.

NOTE: the following is posted on Rumble, a platform that respects free speech, unlike Youtube:

Today is the first FULL day of activity at the Roundhouse in Santa Fe. Having been vaccinated and with evidence to that effect, RGF president Paul Gessing headed to the Capitol for a series of meetings.

Gessing was highly surprised to find out upon attempting to enter the building that his vaccine (Johnson and Johnson administered June 1, 2021) was not acceptable for entry to the “People’s House.” He was told that an ADDITIONAL (booster) shot was required for entry.  Since Gessing had COVID over the holidays despite being vaccinated he has no intention of getting boosted as well.

After some scrambling Gessing managed to gain access to a religious exemption form to enter the building. So, if you plan to come to the Roundhouse this session and are NOT boosted, you should definitely reach out to a conservative member of the Legislature or their office in order to obtain a religious exemption form and gain entry.

Whatever your opinions on the vaccine (or masks which are also required for entry, cloth masks will do) the push for boosters is NOT based on any scientific “consensus.” As was WIDELY reported this fall, no fewer than two top scientists at the Food and Drug Administration QUIT over the Biden Administration’s push for widespread boosters. Those scientists wrote a scathing critique of Biden’s booster policy in The Lancet.  

The Rio Grande Foundation’s podcast Tipping Point New Mexico takes on some difficult and controversial issues. Unfortunately, that is simply too much for many social media companies including Youtube.

In fact, the company recently removed an interview with former UNM Hospital pediatric cardiologist Dr. Deane Waldman. You can see the note from Youtube below which goes on to say, “YouTube doesn’t allow claims about COVID-19 vaccinations that contradict expert consensus from local health authorities or the World Health Organization (WHO). Learn more here.”

The Rio Grande Foundation HAS NEVER opposed the vaccines. Rather, there appear to be some legitimate concerns about certain heart issues in young men and menstrual changes in women. It appears that Youtube/Google would like us to not be able to discuss these and other health issues.

You can watch the censored interview with Dr. Waldman below and subscribe to our new Rumble feed:

As of the day before the 2022 Legislature kicks off, here are some of the worst bills introduced in the session (so far). You can see the updated list of bills introduced in the session here as of January 17, 2022. More will be added. Given the large number of bills likely to be introduced, I’ll also offer a brief thought on how likely they are to pass:

HB 6, Reps. Nathan Small (D) Brian Egolf (D), Kristina Ortez (D), Sens. Siah Correa Hemphill (D), Mimi Stewart (D). Sets legislative framework for “net-zero” CO2 emissions in State of New Mexico. Likelihood of passage: High as Gov. MLG has said she wants to make New Mexico “net-zero.”

HB 11, Reps. Debra Sariñana (D) and Meredith Dixon (D). Creates a tax credit of up to $5,000 and 40% of the cost of “energy storage” systems. Likelihood of passage: High This yet another part of the push toward unreliable forms of electricity that will demand massive and costly battery storage.

HB 14, Reps. Christine Chandler (D) and Debra M. Sariñana (D). Allows local governments to issue Industrial Revenue Bonds (IRB) and gross receipts tax deductions for “energy storage” systems. Likelihood of passage: High (see above).

HB 33, Rep. Joanne Ferrary (D). Imposes massive (regressive) tax hike on tobacco consumers at a time of massive budget surpluses. Likelihood of passage: Moderate (it will hard for legislators to explain a tax hike at a time of record budget surpluses).

HB 34, Rep. Joanne Ferrary (D). Expands and extends an already-generous solar panel tax credit that disproportionately benefits wealthy New Mexicans. Likelihood of passage: High (furthers “green” agenda and benefits well-connected, wealthy solar customers and companies).

HB 71, Rep. Matthew McQueen (D) and Jason C. Harper (R). Allows taxes on residential property to rise by up to 10% ANNUALLY (as opposed to 3% currently). Likelihood of passage: Moderate (Property taxes are notoriously unpopular and it is hard to see the Legislature passing a big tax hike in an election year, even with a GOP co-sponsor).

HB 75, Rep. Sponsor Patricia Roybal Caballero (D). Sets up a state-run bank in New Mexico. New Mexico already has a robust network of banks and credit unions, the last thing it needs is a government-run and taxpayer-financed bank. Likelihood of passage: Moderate this is a concept likely to be seen as too far beyond the pale even for many Democrats.

HB 78 and HB 132 Rep. Patricial Roybal Caballero (D) is on HB 78 while HB 132 is more likely to pass and sponsored by Rep. Susan K. Herrera, Speaker Brian Egolf, Reps. Joy Garratt (D), Phelps Anderson (I) and Daymon Ely (D). Both bills create artificial limits on interest rates charged by certain lenders in New Mexico that will limit credit availability to those with poor or no credit. Likelihood of passage: High (HB 132) as this concept has numerous groups supporting and high-interest loans are misunderstood and by legislators, the media, and the population at large.

HB 126, Reps. Tara L. Lujan (D) and Pamelya Herndon (D), Creates all manner of “diversity” requirements for state government employees, creates a “Chief Diversity Officer” as well as “diversity” and “inclusion” liaisons in State government, requires an annual report on whether the State is achieving its diversity and inclusion goals. Is New Mexico State government not “woke” enough? This legislation is for you. Likelihood of passage: Moderate.

HJR 2 / SJR2 Reps. Joanne J. Ferrary (D), Tara L. Lujan (D), Gail Chasey (D), Sens. Antoinette Sedillo Lopez, (D), Harold Pope (D). Purports to provide the people of New Mexico with vaguely-defined “environmental rights” includng the right to a “clean and healthy environment and the “right to protction of the environment.” The vague provisions contained in this amendment will simply result in more expensive lawsuits and unnecessary regulations. This is a Constitutional amendment and extremely vaguely worded which might scare away supporters.  Likelihood of passage: Moderate.

SB 8, Sens. Peter Wirth (D),   Katy M. Duhigg (D), Harold Pope (D) Carrie Hamblen (D), and  Rep. Javier Martínez (D) would “reform” voting in New Mexico by allowing 16 and 17 year olds to vote, creating a permanent absentee voter list, and permitting people without an official state ID to register to vote online by using their full Social Security number. Likelihood of passage: High

SB 21, Sen. Bill Tallman (D), Provides a tax subsidy for electric vehicles which tend to be driven by wealthy New Mexicans and is thus “regressive.” If there is one policy area where New Mexico’s Legislature loves to pour subsidies it would be for supposed “green” initiatives. Likelihood of passage: High

SB 99, Sen. Leo Jaramillo (D), Creates a new “State Transit Fund” to further funnel money from state taxpayers to failed transit projects. This is a new idea this session, but with so much money floating around there is always reason to be concerned about new wasteful spending. Likelihood of passage: Moderate

As the New Mexico Legislature’s 30-day session kicks off on Tuesday with massive budget surpluses and (likely) massive spending increases, there is at least a fighting chance for some kind of tax cuts. The Gov.  has put forth a proposal for a slight gross receipts tax cut while a few other bills have been introduced to eliminate the tax on Social Security. You can find them here and here.

Sen. Bill Tallman (D-Bernalillo County) has also introduced a bill that would eliminate the Social Security tax for. 90% of New Mexicans. We have not been able to find the pre-filed bill, BUT there is a news story about it here. Unfortunately, rather than providing a pure tax cut, the bill strives to be “revenue neutral” by adding new taxes on tobacco users.

Given New Mexico’s incredibly large budget surplus ($1.6 billion) AND the massive spending expected this session (a 13.5% increase or $1 billion), the ONLY acceptable option is to eliminate Social Security taxation (reducing revenues by a mere $85 million), not to replace one tax with other tax hikes as Tallman would do. It also happens that Tallman’s bill would be “regressive.” That is, it would cut taxes on relatively high income seniors while raising them on relatively low income smokers and other tobacco users.

New Mexico is one of just 13 states that tax Social Security. It’s time to eliminate New Mexico’s Social Security tax once and for all.

You can find the full budget here. It represents a 13.5% annual increase over the prior budget. There is not a whole lot to get excited about for anyone who cares about economic (as opposed to government) growth, but here are some interesting items:

1. She doesn’t explicitly discuss her small GRT cut in her budget. I went back and found an old Bill Richardson budget online and you can bet HE mentioned cutting taxes! With the State experiencing banner growth in the budget thanks  to the oil and gas industry (and Washington money-printing), cutting taxes SHOULD be a much higher priority.
2. In her budget,  Lujan Grisham claims, “This administration has created more jobs during the pandemic than the prior administration created in eight years – roughly 40,000.” She provides ZERO footnotes or citations for her assertion which is made on page IV of her budget. We used data from Bureau of Labor Statistics and found a very different story. Using the “total civilian labor force” for the beginning/end/most recent month available (November 2021) we see that the number of jobs grew by 5.3% under Martinez while Lujan Grisham is at-1.5 percent since the start of her term.  It is hard to tell how Lujan Grisham justifies her claim aside from absolving herself from ALL jobs LOST during the pandemic and then taking credit for ALL jobs CREATED since its darkest days.
3. Lujan Grisham’s budget request includes $2.5 million to create a 15-person “Climate Change Bureau.” (page XIX). The newly-created bureaucracy would cost taxpayers more than $166,000 per employee and would give the Gov. a paid group to push her radical environmental agenda.
4. Finally, while there are many items contained in the budget to take issue with, Gov. Lujan Grisham proudly repeats one of her most disturbing lines. On page III she touts “a cradle-to-career education system for all New Mexicans.” You don’t have to be a raging libertarian to be skeptical of a government that pushes its long tentacles into the cradle.

UPDATED: 1/25/22

Several COVID-related issues at the start of this podcast. Cases are at record levels in New Mexico. More than 4,000 cases for the first time EVER. Lujan Grisham extended the universal indoor mask mandate yet again on Friday. Only WA, OR, CA, HI, IL, and NM have universal indoor mask mandates.

SCOTUS heard case on Biden COVID mandates. The ignorance of several justices, especially the Court’s liberals, was striking regarding basic COVID and even legal issues. Australia is refusing Tennis player access to the nation due to the Nation’s vaccine mandate. Novak Djokovic had COVID and an exemption, but JUST received a ruling that allowed into the country to play in the Australian Open. AOC has COVID after partying in Florida. Chicago’s teachers’ unions are refusing to teach (generating national outrage and even with the Mayor). So far the same hasn’t happened in New Mexico and schools remain open. The CDC after two years is finally going to study those hospitalized WITH COVID as opposed to because of COVID;

MLG releases her budget proposal for the upcoming session with 13.5% annual increase, Paul and Wally discuss. What will happen during the upcoming 30-day session?

Voting bill is bad news: it would extend the early voting period to the Sunday before election day, creating a permanent absentee voter list, automatically register people to vote with a transaction at the MVD, allow electronic signatures for nominating petitions, create a straight-party ballot option. It would also allow 16 and 17-year-olds to vote in local elections, like school board elections.

Conservative legislative group ALEC ranks MLG “worst governor in the nation.” 

As expected, US greenhouse emissions rose in Biden’s first year.

Emissions rose by about 6.2 percent in 2021 over 2020. Still, emissions remained about 5 percent below 2019 levels;

A lawsuit filed by former CFO over alleged fraud totaling $200 million. Allegations are made against: Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, Attorney General Hector Balderas, New Mexico State Auditor Brian Colón, Economic Development Cabinet Secretary Alicia Keys, and current managers at Spaceport America.” 

Remember when liberals (both here in New Mexico and around the nation) were ripping into Kristi Noem (SD) and Ron DeSantis (FL) for their supposedly poor management of COVID. For a taste, check out this particularly bad piece by Milan Simonich of the Santa Fe New Mexican and see comments from the “illustrious” Liz Thomson below (who repeatedly used the Twitter hashtag #deathsantis this fall as a COVID wave hit Florida.

Well, according to the COVID tracking site World o Meters, South Dakota now has a lower “COVID deaths per million” than New Mexico and if trends continue for another week or so, Florida will soon slip below New Mexico as well (see below). Both South Dakota and Florida have been MUCH more open economically and in terms of their schools than has New Mexico.

In fact, MLG has followed the failed leftist playbook of masking, social distancing, and hectoring people about vaccines. She has NOT pushed treatments such as monoclonal antibodies or addressed obesity as a leading risk factor as Ron DeSantis has.

You can see both the deaths per million number below in the far right column and also see the trend which favors Florida in particular, a much higher-population state than New Mexico.

On Friday the US Supreme Court held a special hearing to hear a case on Joe Biden’s COVID mandates on businesses of 100 or more employees.

Having watched the Supreme Court do its work for decades, it has always been OUR assumption that while we may disagree with justices on their decisions, these are at least well-informed people who simply read the law/Constitution differently. Friday’s hearing proved a disheartening display of flat-out ignorance (not just of the law, but of basic facts involving COVID 19) that have thrown our faith in yet another American institution into doubt.

Justice Sotomayor’s failure to grasp basic facts was striking regarding basic COVID issues. She said:

• We have over 100,000 children, which we’ve never had before, in serious condition, and many on ventilators.” In reality, the current seven-day average for this age group is 766 hospitalizations.
• “Omicron just as dangerous as Delta” when in reality early studies show Omicron to be less deadly;
• And, more fundamentally on the legal front, she failed to grasp why a state “I’m not sure I understand the distinction why the states would have the power [to institute a mandate such as OSHA’s], but the federal government wouldn’t,” (police powers).

Justice Breyer jumped in claiming that the US had “750 million new cases” of coronavirus on Thursday not realizing apparently that the US has about 335 million people.

Finally, Justice Elena Kagan claimed misguidedly that “The best way” to prevent the spread of Covid-19 was “for people to get vaccinated” when in reality the vaccines have done little to “stop the spread” (which is at record levels right now despite high vaccine rates) and instead do seem to mitigate against the worst outcomes of the Virus.

If the Court were to rule in support of this vaccine mandate it would be one of the most sweeping expansions of federal executive power in American history. The Court has ruled in favor of state-level vaccine mandates and unfortunately refused to hear New Mexico’s (also misguided) vaccine mandate which was implemented by MLG on her own without the Legislature, but has NEVER allowed such a sweeping mandate at the federal level imposed by the President, let alone without Congress which should be the basic minimum required by the Supreme Court for ANY major new policy. Better still, they should read the Constitution which grants LIMITED power to the federal government.

RGF president Paul Gessing recently sat down with Channel 7 KOAT to discuss  the Gov.’s budget. The original interview covered a variety of issues within the budget but wound up being JUST about the law enforcement component.

While most New Mexicans, especially those in crime-plagued Albuquerque, support the hiring and retention of law enforcement, Gessing was actually referring to the fact that Gov. MLG’s budget has a “slight” increase in funding for Department of Corrections while the Legislature’s budget CUTS funding. The assertion is that New Mexico’s prison population is declining and therefore less money is needed.

It is all well and good to cut funding for corrections, but with violent crime at record levels in Albuquerque, it would seem like violent offenders should be filling up those prison cells…but perhaps the courts are not doing THEIR jobs? Either way, that conversation was left on the proverbial cutting room floor. Click on the image below for the story.

The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a conservative group of state legislators from all over the country. They share policy success (and failures) and create model bills based on concepts that have worked in one or more states that legislators might want to introduce elsewhere.

The exist in New Mexico although given our “deep blue” politics, you’d have to look hard to find any ALEC policies that have made their way into legislation.  But, a new report by Art Laffer and Jonathan Williams (a previous RGF luncheon guest) ranks the nation’s 50 governors on a few basic metrics and finds Lujan Grisham to be the VERY worst governor in the entire country.

Policies included various economic and education policy issues including education freedom, interstate migration, welfare dependency, and unemployment rates.

It is no surprise at all that Lujan Grisham is the worst Gov. in the nation. RGF has postulated in the past that upon taking office she took every policy RGF supported and advocated doing the opposite. And then she locked down New Mexico’s economy and kept struggling New Mexico kids out of school for a year due to her misguided “Zero-COVID” mindset.

The BEST Gov. in the nation in the report is Kristi Noem of South Dakota who famously kept her state open during COVID.  You can read the full report below:

A fun way to “get your name in the paper” at Rio Grande Foundation involves being the subject of an “off the wall” attack from some left-wing group or another. Take today’s Albuquerque Journal which included this from Michael Jensen of Conservation Voters New Mexico. His piece is a (sort of) response to the following (which also appeared in the Journal) in which RGF pushed back against the “Energy Transition Act.” That legislation was passed in 2019 and exclusively deals with forcing New Mexico utilities to transition to wind and solar in coming years, arguing (as PNM has) that the utility is going to struggle to keep the lights on as utilities are forced to abandon reliable fossil fuels.

There are too many silly points made in Jensen’s column to fully address them in a coherent way, but he spends considerable time arguing about oil and gas. Oil and gas are only tangentially related to New Mexico’s Energy Transition Act. In fact, the law forces NM utilities to abandon fossil fuels (mostly coal and natural gas) and even nuclear from electricity generation. The ETA DOES NOT deal with motor vehicles or other fossil fuels.

As the graph below clearly. illustrates, a vast majority of the electricity generated in New Mexico comes from coal and natural gas. smaller (albeit growing) amounts are derived from wind and solar, but coal and natural gas are being targeted for total elimination.

On this week’s interview, Paul talks to Carla Sonntag. Carla is CEO of the New Mexico Business Coalition, a pro-business activism group that works on public policy in New Mexico. Paul and Carla discuss the Coalition’s activities and the issues it covers. Specifically, Carla and Paul address the Coalition’s interest in energy issues from the oil and gas industry to utilities. Finally, they address the push by some legislators to take over PNM (and others) and create a new statewide government-owned utility monopoly to carry out the radical green agenda.