I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
Last week, I wrote about how Secretary of State Dianna Duran alleged 64,000 cases of ‘possible voter fraud’ or over 10 percent of the people who voted in the 2010 elections. Heath Haussamen of NMPolitics.com has been trying to get a hold of records showing that 37 foreign nationals voted in the 2010 elections, but has been getting the run-around:
Since then, I tried a backdoor route to obtain some of the information, filing a public records request with the state’s Taxation and Revenue Department (TRD) for e-mail correspondence between its Motor Vehicle Division and Duran’s office, and all documents attached to those e-mails.
The attachments are at the heart of Duran’s claim. Using those spreadsheets and other documents from TRD, she says she compared voter registration forms with MVD’s foreign national database to come up with her assertion that at least 117 foreign nationals had registered to vote and that 37 of them had voted in New Mexico elections.
The good news? The administration of Gov. Susana Martinez, through TRD, rejected Duran’s claim that executive privilege allowed her to withhold some information I and others requested.
The bad news? Tax and Revenue found its own justification for refusing to release information. And it’s a justification the N.M. Foundation for Open Government says is questionable.
If Duran has a case, she should release the records.
