Elections

Days after she failed to secure the votes of 20 percent of delegates at the GOP’s preprimary nominating convention, Republican gubernatorial candidate Janice Arnold-Jones is trying to show that she has momentum by announcing the endorsements of two of her colleagues in the state House.

Former elections chief A.J. Salazar raised concerns about the lack of a contract for the storage of voting machines at the private facility during a March 12 interview with The Independent. But chain-of-custody paperwork and regular inventories are kept for those machines and shared with the Secretary of State’s office—and it is unclear how their integrity could be compromised, AES President Terry A. Rainey told The Independent this week.

KUNM’s Jim Williams sends along this update on the Secretary of State’s office:
Secretary of State Mary Herrera is firing back over allegations that her office is poorly managed.  As KUNM reported last week, several former Elections division employees have echoed the contentions of a former Elections Director that Deputy Secretary Francisco Trujillo is interfering with how [...]

Joe Campos qualified to appear on the primary ballot for lieutenant governor on Saturday after all, the Democratic Party of New Mexico has decided. The party says it’s required by state law to round up Campos’ 19.69 percent of delegate votes from the preprimary nominating convention to 20 percent – the threshold for qualifying for the ballot at the convention.

Common Cause New Mexico is touting new polling that shows that voters in the 1st and 2nd congressional districts are concerned about special-interest influence in Washington and want campaign-finance reform.

Democratic Lt. Gov. candidate Joe Campos says he’s staying in the race even though he didn’t get 20 percent at the party’s preprimary nominating convention on Saturday.

The New York Times is the latest news outlet to single out U.S. Rep. Harry Teague, D-N.M., as one of the House Democrats who could decide the fate of health-care reform, highlighting the immense pressure on Teague from the left and right as the debate comes to a head.

Democratic Lt. Gov. candidate Jerry Ortiz y Pino says he’s staying in the race even though he didn’t get 20 percent at the party’s preprimary nominating convention on Saturday. “I am not at all discouraged by this hurdle,” Ortiz y Pino wrote in an e-mail to supporters.

A federal agency is ponying up around $600,000 this year to provide upkeep for New Mexico’s more than 1,900 voting tabulators and voting machines.
New Mexico won a federal grant from the U.S. Elections Assistance Commission to pay the maintenance bill after Bernalillo County contributed $33,000, Bernalillo County Clerk Maggie Toulouse Oliver told The Independent.

Democratic Land Commissioner candidate Harry Montoya says he’s staying in the race even though he didn’t get 20 percent at the party’s preprimary nominating convention on Saturday.

Democratic Land Commissioner candidate Sandy Jones says he’s staying in the race even though he didn’t get 20 percent at the party’s preprimary nominating convention on Saturday. Jones said he’ll have the necessary signatures to stay in the race “in the next couple of days.”
“Literally two minutes after the results came in we were getting phone [...]

With recounting of the ballots out of the way, here are the final numbers from the Democratic Party’s preprimary convention held Saturday:
Lieutenant governor
• Brian Colón: 34.54 percent
• Lawrence Rael: 22.15 percent
• Joe Campos: 19.69 percent
• Jerry Ortiz y Pino: 18.87 percent
• Linda Lopez: 4.73 percent

The Democratic Party of New Mexico is accusing Republican gubernatorial candidate Susana Martinez, Doña Ana County’s district attorney, of “hiding” public records. The party has been allowed to inspect the records, but it was not allowed to scan any records and has not yet received requested copies. The director of the Foundation for Open Government says it sounds like the Democrats have “run into problems with attitude more than legal compliance” from the DA’s office.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Susana Martinez gained in stature at today’s Republican Party preprimary nominating convention. Allen Weh did what he needed to do. And Pete Domenici Jr. is down but not necessarily out. That’s how Albuquerque pollster Brian Sanderoff analyzed the results following today’s vote.

In the Democratic lieutenant governor’s race, only Brian Colón and Lawrence Rael qualified today to appear on the ballot, and in the land commissioner race only one candidate – Ray Powell – topped the 20 percent threshold.