It’s been an eventful week here, with a blistering state audit of our county government then a primary election.
Folks should read the audit. It’s not good. Nor is it the end of the world. The only thing I’d add now to what I wrote last week is to applaud County Commissioner Susana Chaparro. She showed up at Progressive Voters Alliance Thursday evening to discuss the audit, saying that it wasn’t good but that she wanted the group to hear it from her, and rather taking ownership – which is right, even though a lot of what the auditors found long pre-dated the terms of any present commissioners. She didn’t dismiss the audit as “all politics,” as one commissioner reportedly did. I’ve read most of the 355 pages; and it’s detailed, factual, and professional. The problems can and should be fixed.
I was glad for many reasons that Deb Haaland whomped Sam Bregman. He didn’t deserve to be our governor. She may. I’m already hearing some feelings (in men) that she could be hurt in the general election by the disastrous governorship of a Republican woman then the highly disappointing eight years of a Democratic woman. Notably, in a primary for state secretary of state, between Santa Fe’s County Clerk, Katherine Clark, and our own Amanda Lopez Askin, who was appointed initially by our county commission to fill a vacancy, then won re-election twice. The last time a Democrats nominated someone from down here for a statewide office, it was Jerry Apodaca for governor. Ironically, as a young reporter I hung out with Jerry and Clara for most of the weekend preceding the primary. He was one of four Democrats vying for the nomination, and was not the favorite. His governorship generated a bit of national conversation about him and Clara being the Hispanic Kennedys.
If our local voting told us anything, other than the low turnout reminding us of voter apathy, it told us that voters here like a lot of the incumbents, and did not respond favorably to bunches of outside cash being spent to attack a respected local incumbent. District 33 Representative Micaela Lara Cadeña won more than handily, despite vicious attacks by Jupiter Project supporters; and Daisy Maldonado, a county commission candidate who had strongly criticized the commission over Jupiter, also one. Meanwhile two incumbents – Dist. 37 Rep. Joanne Ferrary and Sheriff Kim Stewart – strongly influenced our choice of a successor. Ferrary, retiring, strongly endorsed Lori Martinez, who won a fairly close race, while Stewart, term-limited, did the same for former Anthony Police Chief Vanessa Ordoñez, who narrowly beat Jim Frietze, a strong candidate endorsed by the deputies’ union. (Martinez will face former county commissioner Isabella Solis in November, while Ordoñez will face long-time-ago former sheriff Todd Garrison. (Incumbent assessor Gena Montoya Ortega also won.)
This year’s fondness for incumbents may not extend to commissioners. The District 1 incumbent chose not to run, and recently-resigned commissioner Shannon Reynolds lost his challenge to the assessor.
“Apathy is a problem,” officials say of voters. “That county audit confirms my disgust with gov’t bodies,” texted a friend of mine, a cagey card-player. Although Cardeña, Maldonado, and Askin are activists or professionals who didn’t initially imagine seeking public office, and mean what they say, wealth has way too much influence on our politics. While I care passionately who wins some of these elections, voters’ trust and interest aren’t a given. It must be earned.
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[The above column appeared Sunday, 7 June 2026, in the Las Cruces Sun-News and on the newspaper's website and (presently) on KRWG’s website. A shortened and sharpened radio commentary version of this Sunday column will air during the week on KRWG (90.1 FM) and on KTAL-LP (101.5 FM / ]
[The headline folks at the newspaper chose a headline that is technically accurate but could mislead folks: “Voters back incumbents despite scathing county audit | Opinion.” I do mention voters backing incumbents or the endorsees of incombents, and also the audit. I presume the word “despite” in there refers to the fact that the audit didn’t put voters off politicians so strongly that they’d try to throw all the rascals out; but someone could read the to suggest that the re-elected incumbents were county commissioners responsible for the Project Jupiter problem. None was. Of the four commissioners who so hastily approved the project, Chair Manny Sanchez’s term was not up this year, while incumbent Chris Schialjo-Hernandez [wisely] chose not to run for a second term. (It was his seat to which strongly anti-Jupiter activist Daisy Maldonado was nominated by the Democrats. In November, she’ll face Republican nominee Samantha Barncastle-Salopek, who will likely prove a formidable candidate.) A third, Commissioner Shannon Reynolds, had resigned his seat in order to challenge County Assessor Eugenia Montoya Ortega. He lost. Gloria Gameros, initially elected in 2024, was also not up for re-election yet. Further, one of the incumbents re-elected to the Legislature was Cadeña, who has criticized the rush to genuflect to the Jupiter gods.]
[I was impressed that despite all the money being spent to mislead us, Jupiter’s candidates didn’t win. Today’s Albuquerque Journal contained a huge Jupiter ad that asked a bunch of questions, something like:
Do you support:
Sustainable local water use?
Protecting our air?
More good paying local jobs?
Improving our schools, infrastructure and drinking water?
Then you support Project Jupiter.
The “sustainable water use” is almost surely nonsense, but they are using a “closed-loop” cooling system that should result in less water use; but the “protecting our air” sure sounds like pure fantasy, not pure air. Reasonable people can argue, and do, that the promised benefits of the project justify an extremely bad affect on our air and atmosphere; but I’d love to watch the face of any knowledgeable person who argued that tossing up as much in the way of pollutants as Albuquerque and Las Cruces (combined) do is somehow “protecting our air!” ]
