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.
New Mexico native and three-tour Iraq veteran Joseph Callan, an organizer of Iraq Veterans Against the War, wants the military to stop deploying brain damaged and traumatized troops to combat zones. The illegal practice has led to repeated brain injuries and harder-to-treat cases of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, one Army doctor and epidemiologist told The Independent — before he was ordered to stop speaking to the press.
Public Regulation Commissioner Jerome Block, Jr. has struggled to pay more than $2,000 in debts over the past year, including one to a fellow commissioner and another to a youth group on whose board of directors he sits. Those debts are just the latest headache for Block, who said he has already paid $400,000 in legal fees to defend himself against criminal charges stemming his handling of public campaign funds.
Incumbent Gary King appears to have prevailed over Republican challenger and Clovis District Attorney Matt Chandler after a heated race for the New Mexico attorney general’s office.
Two Republicans and one Democrat took three open Public Regulation Commission (PRC) seats that were up for election Tuesday.
Patrick Lyons, Ben Hall and Theresa Becenti-Aguilar were all elected to the PRC, arguably the state’s most powerful regulatory agency.
State Auditor Hector Balderas, a Democrat, was re-elected Tuesday as the state’s top financial watchdog.
Balderas had received 277,484 votes (54.1%), according to unofficial Secretary of State returns as of 11:10 p.m. Tuesday. His Republican challenger Errol Chavez…
Voters rejected two proposed constitutional amendments that would have relaxed term limits on elected county officials from eight to 12 years and would have allowed state lawmakers to accept positions in other branches of state government.
Democrat Stephanie DuBois has lost her bid for the powerful and controversial Public Regulation Commission (PRC)’s District 2 seat to outgoing state land commissioner Patrick Lyons, a Republican, she conceded at 9:20 p.m. Tuesday night. Lyons will replace PRC chairman…
Dem, Republican volunteers ‘equally aggressive,’ Taos Clerk says
Disruptive Republican poll challengers at six precincts in Doña Ana County have been “reprimanded” and warned that they will be removed from polling precincts if they continue to behave inappropriately, Doña Ana County Deputy Clerk Mario O. Jimenez III told…
Federal agents told to ‘back off’ after crowding Acoma voters
There have been very few reports of disruptions at New Mexico polling stations, Common Cause NM Executive Director Steven Robert Allen told The Independent at 9:25 a.m. Tuesay.
“Just isolated events so far — nothing big,” Allen said. “At El…
The U.S. Justice Department has announced it will send agents to monitor some polling places in Texas after tea party and Republican Party-certified poll challengers allegedly harassed dozens of early voters and poll officials.
Tea party activists are fanning out across…
Republican Party operatives from Texas have been training Albuquerque tea party activists as poll challengers for more than two weeks, GOP officials told The Independent Wednesday evening. The Democrats are training challengers of their own. But such “ballot security” efforts do more harm than good, a new study suggests, rarely catching fraudulent voting but frequently discouraging legitimate voters from casting ballots.
The U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has asked Interior Department investigators to reopen their probe into former Farmington BLM area manager Steve Henke‘s acceptance of undeclared gifts from the oil and gas firms regulated by his…
In a sharp rebuke of Democratic Secretary of State Mary Herrera (whose office will announce next Tuesday’s election results), five of New Mexico’s major newspapers endorsed state Sen. Diana Duran, Herrera’s Republican challenger.
The New Mexico Foundation for Open Government (FOG) has called on state and local governments to end excessive copying fees for public records — fees that violate the state public records law, according to FOG director Sarah Welsh.…
Soot from commercial space flights at the New Mexico-based Spaceport America could dramatically hasten global climate change, according to a new study.
While rain will remove rocket exhaust soot from the lower atmosphere, carbon particles will remain in…
New Mexico is getting a federal grant to help beef up consumer protection efforts. The money will be used to help consumers file complaints and to appeal insurance company decisions, track and analyze trends in those complaints, and to fund a full-time staff position to assist consumers who are seeking health insurance coverage,
The state Division of Insurance will not publicly disclose a corrective action plan prepared in response to a scathing audit that slammed Division oversight of the insurance industry, according to an e-mailed Division response to The Independent’s Inspection…
Planned policy changes announced last month to restrict employees’ contact with journalists at the Public Regulation Commission (PRC) will not be implemented in the near future, Chief of Staff Michael Rivera has told The Independent.
“It’s going…
