New Mexico is the site of one of the country’s most competitive Senate races, according to Politico. The site’s monthly ranking shows New Mexico as the eighth most competitive race because of the candidacies of Democrat Rep. Martin Heinrich and Republican former Rep. Heather Wilson.

Politico says of next year’s New Mexico Senate race:

With the exception of Tim Kaine, Rep. Martin Heinrich’s vault into the open seat Senate contest marked the biggest recruiting victory for Democrats over the past month. With former Rep. Heather Wilson also in, both parties have formidable forces to replace Sen. Jeff Bingaman. But primaries loom: Lt. Gov. John Sanchez has done the D.C. rounds and Rep. Steve Pearce hasn’t ruled out a tea party-fueled campaign and clearly wants to be a resonant voice in the nominating process. On the Democratic side, there’s some talk about the opportunity to put forth a fresh Hispanic face. That puts Rep. Ben Ray Lujan in a pickle. A former aide says the seventh-generation New Mexican is “really torn on the race.” Democrats privately worry a Heinrich-Lujan primary could rip open up some racial fault lines and tear apart the party.

Who Won March: Heinrich

Latest Poll: Heinrich 50%, Wilson 39% (Public Policy Polling, 2/4-2/6, 545 New Mexico voters)

Last month, the Politico ranking had New Mexico ninth. However, both Republicans and Democrats recruited top-tier candidates in the month. And a few second-tier candidates remain in the fringes of the race.

There has been little polling in the race, as the post shows, but both parties may have multiple potential top-tier candidates still on the sidelines, waiting to decide.

At this same time in the 2008 cycle, the April the year before the election, The Fix coincidentally had New Mexico ranked in the same spot. This was before then-Sen. Pete Domenici announced he would not seek re-election. Eventually, Democrats easily won the seat.

This time, Sen. Jeff Bingaman has already announced his retirement.

On Monday, former U.S. Rep. Heather Wilson announced she will run for U.S. Senate. Wilson quickly picked up endorsements from prominent New Mexico Republicans, including former U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici, and criticisms from Democrats, who noted her involvement in the scandal of fired U.S. Attorney David Iglesias.

Wilson’s announcement came after U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman announced that he would not seek re-election in 2012. Bingaman has served in the U.S. Senate since 2012.

“Mother, wife, small business owner, Air Force officer, member of Congress, I am and have been all of these things,” Wilson said. “And today, you can add one more: I am a candidate for the United States Senate.”

Wilson said she’s running because she is “deeply concerned about the future of our country.” The choices made by the current White House and “a Democratic-led Senate are pointing us in the wrong direction,” she said.

Federal government has had a 24 percent increase in federal spending over the last two years. “They’ve gone on a spending spree,” Wilson declared.

This would be Wilson’s second attempt at becoming a U.S. Senator. After Domenici decided not to run in the 2008 elections, Wilson ran and lost in the primary to Steve Pearce. Both Wilson and Pearce had left their seats in the U.S. House for the run.

Pearce was defeated in the general election by Tom Udall, who also left his seat in the House for the Senate run.

The former congresswoman received some high profile endorsements out of the gate. Domenici, who also endorsed her in 2008, said in a statement, “The nation needs her, and it’s up to us to send her there. I endorse her candidacy wholeheartedly and I’m going to do everything I can to help her win.”

Wilson said that “almost half of the Republicans in the House or in the Senate are endorsing me today.”

Wilson also received the endorsement of former U.S. Congressmen Bill Redmond and Manuel Luján.

“I watched Heather serve in the House for ten years,” Lujan said in a statement. “She stood up for policies that help small businesses create jobs and was known by everyone as the ‘go to’ person when people had problems with the federal government.”

Former Republican gubernatorial candidates Allen Weh, Janice Arnold Jones and Pete Domenici, Jr., were also in attendance at the announcement.

Democrats quickly reacted to the entrance of Wilson, the first top-tier candidate in the race to replace Bingaman. The state Democratic Party referenced her role in the scandal of Iglesias.

“New Mexico voters will not soon forget the image of a desperate Heather Wilson trying to influence a federal investigation to benefit her campaign in 2006,” Democratic Party of New Mexico chair Javier Gonzales said in a statement. “That’s the kind of politics you get with Heather Wilson and it’s the wrong kind of politics for New Mexico.”

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee created a video painting Wilson as a Washington, D.C., insider.

Pearce also weighed in on Wilson’s announcement.

“Right now, I am working hard at the job that the people of New Mexico sent me to Congress to do,” Pearce said in a statement. “The filing deadline is still nine months away, and I have plenty of time to make decisions. I’ll reach out to my supporters, but now, for New Mexicans, the stakes are higher than personal ambition.”

White unsuccessfully ran for New Mexico’s 1st Congressional District seat in 2006, losing to Democrat Martin Heinrich. Chandler was the Republican candidate for Attorney General this year who lost to incumbent Democrat Gary King. Pacheco lost the Republican primary for the New Mexico House seat in District 43 earlier this year.

Ortiz defended Martinez earlier this year against charges that Democratic candidate Diane Denish made about Martinez not prosecuting Mexican drug cartel members.

The Department of Corrections Search Committee are Albuquerque city attorney Rob Perry, retired Department of Corrections worker Elmer Bustos, former state Senator and retired Clovis chief of police Caleb Chandler, Bernalillo County Sheriffs Department captain Gregg Marcantel and administrator for the Adult and Juvenile Detention Centers in Roswell Alfonso Solis.

Martinez’s transition team announced that former Senator Pete Domenici is honorary chairman of the inaugural committee and the executive director is Republican fundraiser Andrea Goff.

Saying the national debt must be faced like a war, Domenici insisted that the country must consider all options, including cuts to existing spending—and tax increases.

Domenici is a senior fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Center and co-chairs the group’s Debt Reduction Task Force along with Dr. Alice Rivlin, former Office of Management and Budget Director and the founding Director of the Congressional Budget Office.

The longest-serving U.S. Senator from New Mexico acknowledged that cutting entitlement programs would be unpopular. He said that a group of 10 Republicans and 10 Democrats agreed that “everything has to be on the table” to help eliminate the debt.

Domenici also acknowledged that the war in Iraq was a drain on the budget and said, “I wish we never got in it.”

Domenici voted for the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq in 2002. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, a Democrat who Domenici worked closely with while in the Senate, was one of 21 Senators to vote against the authorization for military force.

On Wednesday night, New Mexico First hosted a public lecture (“Collaborative Politics: Now More Than Ever“) at the National Hispanic Cultural Center, moderated by ABC newsman Sam Donaldson. Mike McCurry, Bill Clinton’s former press secretary, was a keynote speaker along with former RNC chair Frank Fahrenkopf.

The video is provided by our friends at KNME’s New Mexico in Focus.

New Mexico First is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization co-founded in 1986 by Domenici and Bingaman. It has become known for leading innovate, interactive town halls and other events.

According to New Mexico First, the panelists will talk “from the national perspective about the condition of our democracy, cross-party collaboration, and strategies for bringing Americans together without watering down our beliefs.”

The organization will also give awards to New Mexico lawmakers who “put policy above politics,” including U.S. Senator Jeff Bingaman and retired U.S. Senator Pete Domenici, who will receive Lifetime Achievement Awards. Other awards for civic collaboration will go to Ambassador Edward Romero and Edward Lujan. State Senator Tim Jennings is scheduled to accept an award on behalf of his late wife, Patty Jennings, honoring her work on health policy.

New Mexico First is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization co-founded in 1986 by Domenici and Bingaman. It has become known for leading innovate, interactive town halls and other events.

The Domenici Jr. gubernatorial campaign said the campaign tour would include “several stops in Albuquerque and Rio Rancho, a visit to Santa Fe, Los Alamos, Las Vegas, Hobbs, and Carlsbad, as well as some other communities still in the planning stages.”

Former Republican Representative Steve Pearce criticized the decision for different reasons. He said Obama’s announcement on the drilling was “another example of the President being ambiguous, evasive and misleading.”

“The order will lock up more production areas than it releases,” Pearce said in a statement. “Under the Administration’s plan a majority of areas that are open are being once again closed, this includes the Pacific Coast, the Northeastern Atlantic and Bristol Bay, Alaska.”

Pearce is running for Congress against Democrat Rep. Harry Teague, who praised the decision to expand offshore drilling.

Former Senator Pete Domenici, R-N.M., now a senior fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Senator, praised the decision.

“I congratulate the President on his decision to expand access to domestic oil and gas reserves on the Outer Continental Shelf,” said Domenici in a statement.

“As former Chairman of the Senate Energy Committee, I believe that the President’s decision will enhance the effort to develop bipartisan congressional support for bold energy legislation,” Domenici continued.

“Reagan was more pragmatic than those who now quote him,” said former Senator Pete V. Domenici of New Mexico, who was chairman of the Senate Budget Committee in the Reagan years. Both Mr. Domenici and Mr. Simpson began their Senate careers among its most conservative Republicans; each left office labeled as a relative moderate in a party that had shifted farther right on economic and social issues. “Those who claim they’re better Republicans than we are — put their solutions in front of us and let’s see if they’re doable,” Mr. Domenici said.

Simpson served with Domenici in the U.S. Senate from 1979 to 1997.

Domenici retired last year from the U.S. Senate after health problems. He was replaced by now-Sen. Tom Udall.

Susana Martinez

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.

Martinez won the support of 46.65 percent of delegates at the Republican convention. Weh finished second with 26.32 percent, followed by Janice Arnold-Jones at 13.16 percent and Doug Turner at 9.23 percent. Domenici finished last, with 4.61 percent of the vote.

“The big surprise here is the margin of Susana Martinez’s victory,” Sanderoff said. “The second thing that stands out, besides her superb performance, is Pete Domenici’s weak performance.”

If they want to a place on the ballot, candidates who don’t pass the organizational test of winning the support of 20 percent of convention delegates are required by law to collect twice as many signatures as those who do win 20 percent. No candidate who failed to win 20 percent at the convention has ever come back to win the primary.

Regardless, Arnold-Jones, Turner and Domenici all say they plan to stay in the race, which will require about 1,200 more signatures from each.

Staying in the race may make more sense for Domenici than the other two, Sanderoff said. In one recent poll, Domenici led the other candidates with 29.3 percent of the vote, while Martinez came in a distant second at 11.5 percent. Another poll tested each of the GOP gubernatorial hopefuls against the Democrats’ candidate, Diane Denish, and found that only Domenici is anywhere near Denish in terms of support.

“If ever there were a time that someone with 4 percent of the delegates could reasonably consider staying in the race, it would be now, but the Republican delegates have sent a very clear message that he is not their candidate,” Sanderoff said.

Garcia calls it a two-person race between Martinez and Weh

Political analyst Jose Garcia, whose NMSU government class conducted the poll that showed Domenici ahead of the other GOP candidates, disagreed. He said this is now a two-person race between Martinez and Weh.

“I think people are going to be listening very carefully to Susana’s message, and I think they’re going to be comparing it very carefully to Weh’s message,” Garcia said. “Those two candidates have the ear of people.”

Asked if there were any scenario in which one of the other three could win the primary, Garcia said “anything is possible in politics,” but he doesn’t see Domenici, Arnold-Jones or Turner winning.

“If it’s a resounding victory for Susana to get nearly 50 percent, it was also a resounding defeat for Domenici,” Garcia said.

Martinez said in an interview that communication and meetings with small groups were the keys to winning the preprimary, and she plans to continue utilizing both.

“This says that we have to keep working hard, and that the folks who were at the convention are very much wanting to unite,” Martinez said. “We’ll continue to work as though we’re going to be the ones coming out of the primary and heading into the general.”

In a statement released by her campaign, Martinez also said convention delegates share her “values of reform and accountability.”

“Together, we can bring real change to New Mexico after eight years of the failed Richardson/Denish Administration,” the statement read.

The target remains on Domenici’s back

Sanderoff said Republicans who are supporting Martinez like her conservative credentials and believe she is the most electable in November. But he said Domenici will remain the one with a target on his back as long as he’s leading in the polls.

That is already apparent. In a prepared statement following today’s vote, Weh mentioned Domenici but not Martinez.

“With three candidates failing to make the cut, including Pete Domenici Jr., we are pleased to be on the ballot and moving toward Election Day,” Weh said. “This campaign is the people’s campaign, and we can’t wait to get out of the convention hall and get back on the road.”

And the Democratic Party of New Mexico, in a prepared statement, hammered Domenici, the “self-described GOP frontrunner,” for finishing last.

“Following today’s last place finish, the question isn’t whether Pete Domenici Jr. is still the GOP frontrunner – the question is whether he’ll even remain in the race,” said James Hallinan, Democratic Party spokesman. “This vote was a humbling reality check for Pete Domenici Jr. and a clear signal that New Mexico Republicans are now more fractured than ever.”

Nothing more than an ‘informal straw vote’

Domenici Campaign Director Doug Antoon played down the results of the convention vote, calling it an “informal straw vote” and writing in an e-mail that Domenici passed the $300,000 mark in fundraising this week – his seventh in the race.

“For the Domenici campaign, the election is really just beginning,” Antoon said. “We strongly suggest the Democrats take no solace from an informal straw vote.  All scientific polls to date show Domenici virtually even with the Democrat nominee.”

Sanderoff said if the primary election were held today, Domenici would probably win, but “that would be solely due to his family’s name.” Domenici’s father is former U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici.

Because the younger Domenici’s support in polls is largely due to his father’s name recognition, it might not be solid, Sanderoff said.

“He might have the highest but not the widest support,” Sanderoff said.

A news release from Arnold-Jones’ campaign characterized her 13.16 percent as “a strong third place showing,” and Arnold-Jones said she already has more than enough signatures to stay in the race.

“It was a more solid third than I expected. I am delighted,” she said. “Every place I turn, we’re making progress. People are listening to the message. They just may not have been the delegates.”

“I have a message. That’s why I’m running, and I’m going to keep running,” Arnold-Jones said.

Turner said he also has already gathered the necessary signatures to stay in the race.

“As an outsider, the expectation is that you’re not going to have the support from all insiders,” Turner said. “You would like to have support of people in your own party and support of the party machine, but I’m not sure this convention is representative of New Mexico voters or New Mexico Republicans.”

“I’m feeling pretty good,” he added.

Martinez gets ‘instant credibility’

The fact that Martinez won the convention, Sanderoff said, “demonstrates that she’s well organized. You don’t get half the delegates at the convention unless you work it.”

That doesn’t always translate into a primary victory. Former Gov. Gary Johnson finished third in the GOP preprimary in 1994, and he went on to win in June and November.

But in many cases, a preprimary victory sparked momentum that carried a candidate to a primary win. Sanderoff and Garcia said Martinez will now have an easier time raising money, which will help her spread her message.

“This will give her the opportunity to at least promote her victory and gain some instant credibility,” Sanderoff said.

While he’s already counting out Domenici, Arnold-Jones and Turner, Garcia said it’s impossible at this point to predict whether Weh or Martinez will win.

“I don’t think this is over by any stretch of the imagination,” he said.

Sanderoff said it’s too early to call it a two-person race.

“Susana impressed today. Allen Weh did what he had to do. And Pete Jr. will be the wild card,” he said.