By Julia Goldberg, Source New Mexico
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham still uses coffee left over from Gov. Susana Martinez’s administration, which she describes in less-than-flattering terms before offering some at the outset of this interview (we declined). She drank from a mug festooned with the New Mexico flag and noted that her staff had been mocking her all day for wearing metallic pants. Source’s extended interview, however, did not touch on fashion—of which we know zilch—but, instead, focused on the governor’s executive order deploying the National Guard to Albuquerque to help manage that city’s crime problems; threats to New Mexico’s Medicaid from the proposed budget recently approved by U.S. House Republicans; and governing during the Trump administration(s). Lujan Grisham began her second term as governor in 2023, and previously served three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives, representing the state’s 1st Congressional District, and as the state’s health secretary under former Gov. Bill Richardson. The governor’s Chief of Staff Daniel Schlegel and Communications Director Michael Coleman sat in the room during this interview, which has been edited for concision and clarity.
Source NM: Your front desk just received a call from someone who wants you to recall the National Guard from Albuquerque. Are you getting mixed reviews on that?
MLG: I don’t feel like we’ve gotten mixed reviews. I do think people are confused about what it is and maybe we can do a better job explaining it. We’ve previously sent the state police into Albuquerque in a number of ways and strategies, but I’m running out of state police to cover all of that additional work in areas where we’ve got growing risk. The Guard can do all of these administrative police activities [such as] dispatch. Some of them are a little more frontward facing: driving arrestees if they need medical attention, meeting them at the hospital so they can provide security. They can do security at the shelters, where we’ve got [the Albuquerque Police Department] and the [Bernalillo County Sheriff’s] office doing court security. All of that will be managed and directed by Guardsmen and women who were trained military police already, who were retrained about how APD and how the sheriff’s office handles those efforts. And then you have more police on the ground in the areas that need them. All [people are] going to see in a neighborhood is a sheriff’s vehicle with deputies and an APD vehicle [and] APD on cycles the way you would normally see that. I don’t think people quite understand that a tank and people in uniforms like soldiers are not coming into your neighborhoods under this administration. That’s not what we have ever proposed and it’s not something I’m interested in.
Has your stance on public safety changed during your tenure as governor? The New York Times has highlighted, more than once, that your positions have put you in conflict with some other Democrats.
I think maybe because it’s become such a lightning rod favorably to Republicans. But remember, I put 50 state police into the International District primarily, but all along that central corridor, in 2019. I have consistently moved them around and, I would argue, made them a little short staffed for the [Interstate 25] corridor, and then that [Interstate 40] intersection, because there are not enough police. [According to the governor’s office, the state police currently has 100 vacancies.]
We’re an interesting state for crime in a number of ways. High poverty states usually have more difficulties. We didn’t have any behavioral health [due to the dismantling of behavioral health services during Martinez’s administration]. Drug addiction is rampant, though that’s being, I think, attenuated. We’ve got some really good outcomes there, but it’s not gone by any stretch of the imagination. And that I-25/ I-40 connection is just not good for stopping crime. It’s where it moves. All those trucking stops. It’s one of the reasons Albuquerque gets hit so hard. So, I think I’ve been very consistent. I just have not gotten enough attention. And I think you can hear it in my voice. I think what they’re seeing shift is I’m a bit more frustrated about, ‘My gosh, how many more victims do we need?’
Courtesy Office of the Governor
Gov. Lujan Grisham helped the Santa Fe Garden club revitalize the entrance of Fort Marcy Park in preparation for Zozobra last June.
You said at the end of the legislative session you wanted a special session to address crime, juvenile crime in particular. Is that still a possibility?
It is still a possibility. We’ve been meeting with leadership staff. There’s more movement to be in a more productive place for a special session. But we’re not where we need to be and there’s no reason to call them and not have any effort. Plus, I don’t want to do three or four or five or six special sessions, as we see what rolls out from the feds, particularly in the next couple of days [this interview took place on May 21, prior to the U.S. House May 22 passage of the GOP budget bill]. And I think there’s widespread agreement by the Democratic leadership that we should adjust our priorities and our budgets to reflect whatever we need to do and can do in the short term to protect New Mexicans.
Do you have an ideal scenario of how the state would make up Medicaid funding shortfalls?
I think that the fact that we’ve got money in reserves…there are things that we can do. My pitch to the Legislature today—and of course, I haven’t seen what’s coming, although I have a pretty good idea—is we should try to sustain to the degree that we can for a year. And it’s really two [years] between now and when [the 2026 midterm elections] would take hold in Congress, but see if you can stem the closures of rural hospitals and healthcare clinics, and that we don’t lose any movement to hold onto OBGYNs, which is precarious. That’s my perspective today. It’s still a lot of money and we’d have to game it out. It could be as little as $1 billion that we’d have to come up with in healthcare. It could be as much as $3 billion and that’s before you get to education and the [Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program].
Would the strategy for addressing SNAP cuts be similar to Medicaid?
Yes, because you’ve got $1 billion that we get into the state for SNAP. They’re not eradicating it. These are radical cuts. It’s a little bit different and I don’t think people quite understand the nuance of it, but we could be on the hook for up to $300 million if the cuts, as we know them, were voted on today. I don’t think that’s going to happen, and I’m going to fight hard to prevent that from happening. I think I might be doing a call shortly to encourage voters of every persuasion all across the country: These cuts will change your communities as you know them, and people will get hurt and they will die. And when we have food prices as high as they are, and with all the tariff complications, then you have your food budget goes not nearly as far. So, we’d have to figure out SNAP. I’m not as worried, believe it or not, about education, but there are education cuts. There are impacts everywhere.
We haven’t had much success getting anything more than boiler plate out of the Public Education Department as it relates to the Trump administration’s orders about diversity/equity and inclusion to avoid funding cuts.
That makes me happy. And the reason it does is: We don’t discriminate in New Mexico. We’re also a minority-majority state. We think that when they do a blanket search for inclusion or equity or equality, they forget that that’s how we define rural investments. So, we’ve just provided that boilerplate language that we think meets the federal effort at changing what they believe are reverse-discrimination rules. I work hard to not tip the scales against New Mexicans. That department and others are going to respond to the feds as they’re required to, but we have been a little vanilla about, ‘We don’t violate any of those rules right now. Thank you so much for reminding us that there’s no discrimination allowed.’
But in my mind, what the federal government is after is different, right? They want to discriminate against people who have racial differences, gender differences, sexual orientation differences, religious differences. This is a state that’s proud about its inclusion and diversity, but we don’t discriminate, and we just have been saying so. And we’re going to continue to do that and continue to provide Attorney General [Raúl Torrez] with information that we think is harmful and illegal in the way in which the feds might approach any of these issues and see where they go in the courts. All of this is being tested, as you know, in the courts, and we’re doing well in terms of preliminary injunctions. But who knows where it goes? The bigger risk isn’t with these executive orders. The bigger risk is Congress’s action right now.
Do you support AG Torrez’ approach in joining various lawsuits against the Trump administration?
California or New York, collectively, have thousands of lawyers who can just pay attention to the federal lawsuits. [Torrez] doesn’t have that luxury, so he has to be—pardon the pun—judicious, and we certainly understand that. I totally respect that he makes decisions about which places where he’s out front more. But we’re participating robustly, and I have no doubt that he is identified as one of the leaders. We are one of the states with the most to lose, given our federal footprint here, and he’s out there doing it. You’re going to see New York and California and Illinois —the bigger states—get a lot of attention. But I know that our AG is robustly engaged, and I’m glad. I need him to be and he is.
You have not been particularly outspoken or making public speeches about the Trump administration.
Because I don’t know what it does. I don’t need New Mexicans to be targeted when I may not have all the things I need to protect you adequately. I mean, these people at Homeland Security are terrifying. The abandonment of our constitutional rights and due process is terrifying. Now, I don’t want New Mexicans to think that I’m not tough. You know you got to be tough to roll up like a burrito and sneak into the White House. I took on Trump in a very public phone call during [COVID-19], and basically said, ‘You are not telling the truth. You never tell the truth, and I will not let you create a situation where New Mexicans aren’t protected.’ Right after that, we got on as the last tiered state for [Personal Protective Equipment] and COVID vaccines and testing supplies. Now I got that reversed, but what if I hadn’t gotten that reversed and we couldn’t get any testing kits? That’s a big problem, and so I know what the risks are.
But Trump [in his first term] was navigating. Trump [in his second term] has people who will do whatever he asks them to do. This is a whole different agenda. They’ll have to come through me to get to you, but I’m not going to invite them to drive over here and get into a boxing match, particularly when the courts are doing, I think, fairly well in terms of saying, ‘wait a minute, this doesn’t seem right. You don’t have the authority.’ I’m more worried about the cuts than anything.
But let’s talk about the stuff that we have done. We have really strong privacy laws. They’re not getting access to our data. We aren’t providing any of that legally protected information and we aren’t going to do it. They ask for it all the time. You can expect a whole lot more in the 30-day session. You’ve seen us really strengthen reproductive laws. We’ll probably do a state [Emergency Medical Treatment & Labor Act] EMTALA statutory protection, [in case] the feds take that away for reproductive health.
New Mexico plays an important role in the Trump administration’s immigration and deportation agenda, partly because there’s a new so-called militarized buffer zone on the state’s border. What is your take on that?
I don’t like it for the number of risks it introduces to an area that needs more security and support, not more risk. I’m also worried because now I don’t have direct access in that militarized zone either. We would do sometimes…well more than 100 humanitarian rescues in that part of the desert. New Mexico is very dangerous to cross, and they will leave you out there, those coyotes, to die. But I’m more worried about [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] [and] anything that begins to interfere with due process, rights and constitutional protections. Believe it or not, I invited any of the feds in Homeland Security: ‘You want to go after bad actors through the Organized Crime Commission? I’m in. By the book. By the law. Due process.’ No, they’re not interested. What they want is for me to authorize or support them in convincing local police, including the state police, to do ICE enforcement and I’m not doing that because I think it’s unconstitutional.
Katherine Lewin
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham shares a laugh with Democratic leaders after the end of last year’s legislative session.
I wouldn’t call it cultivating a relationship, but part of your job as a governor, you get what you get at the federal level. In the Biden administration, you might imagine that I had some very challenging conversations with [former Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack], who kept burning down stuff here without…providing notice or following the rules. In any administration, I have very terse, aggressive stances, conversations, debates and lawsuits against the federal government. I also have great relationships with certain departments on certain issues, and I think you have to do that.
I do think, frankly, if you can get in to see the president, you can actually get him to be more reasonable. He likes you to propose a deal. I have asked to meet with the White House recently about a number of issues, not the least of which is, they owe me money for [the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant] for the roads. I need them to be serious about public safety. They rejected what we thought was an easy proposal: If you know where someone is on a felony warrant, let’s go, let’s do it together. You’re involved in a in a big fentanyl drug bust? Let’s do it together. I got sort of squarely rejected because their priority is massive deportations. And I said, ‘No, thank you.’ That’s not a deal I’m willing to be engaged in.
We had another big issue I was trying to navigate with them…[which was Liquified Natural Gas]. I was just in Japan and Singapore, and we’re pitching clean LNG. We reduce the world’s carbon footprint if we’re using our LNG, and they can’t produce geothermal and solar and wind in Japan and Singapore. So, they’re going to be using LNG. So, I wanted to talk to the White House about that because they’re not pushing the western states [for energy projects]. They’re pushing one state, and I’ll bet you can guess which one.
[Reporter feebly offers incorrect guess]
No, Alaska. So, I’m going to Alaska next week because: Don’t have a conversation about my energy without me at the table. I couldn’t get in to see the president. I got in to see some very nice liaisons. We’re working on economic development, on introducing the states [to] green energy [and] to a number of other countries. Some of the best methane detection companies are in Japan, so I want them locating here. You don’t need a foe who says, [the energy economy is] only in Alaska. Gretchen and other [Democratic state governors] are doing their jobs. I’m not looking to curry favor with any president. I’m looking to represent New Mexico effectively.
At a recent town Sen. Ben Ray Luján [D-N.M.] held, many attendees seemed to want a stronger response from Democrats. Some of them wanted Sen. Luján to go on the road with [Vermont Sen.] Bernie Sanders and [New York U.S. Rep.] Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. You’ve been in politics a long time: Are you critical of how Democrats are handling this current moment?
I don’t know that I’m critical. For me, the politics here don’t solve the fact that I have to figure out how to keep a rural hospital open. I’m going to tell you how I answered a question recently. A person said, I think, that they didn’t vote for Trump, but they’re Republican —this wasn’t in New Mexico —and they said, ‘I just can’t support this president. What do I tell my kids?’ As people were talking about it, somebody else said, ‘Well, but there’s two sides to Trump.’ And they talked about the nice sides. And I said, ‘No, there are not two sides.’
I have to do my job to get the federal government to apply its resources here…but I’m not going to stand up and support a person who openly lies, is vile and abhorrent and doesn’t seem to understand or care that he creates real risk and people are harmed. I respect the office of presidency. I respect the federal government. I respect all the branches, but I can’t accept that behavior by any person, and I won’t excuse it. So, I get that people are really pissed. I do. That’s the word. I’m really pissed about it my own self.
These tours, I hope, are aimed more at getting Democrats to realize they have real choices. But in those real choices, be careful that you don’t actually create the opposite, which is that we are electing extremists on either side of the political spectrum. Congress can’t run like that. It isn’t running like that. Congress is broken. And when Congress is broken, you have sweeping changes. You can’t govern. You need a little bit of everything. You need a body that can govern and deliver.
We have to be very clear about what we need in [the 2026 midterm elections]. We can never allow people who lie to us, who aim to hurt us and punish us, who use the office for retribution, elected into any office ever again. And we need to be open minded. Don’t let what you think is the perfect solution be the enemy of good overall.
I am going to go to some of these town halls with our delegation because I think people want to know, ‘what do you think, and what are you doing?’ And I do have an opinion, and I am doing stuff, and I think that could be helpful because people deserve elected leaders to have a conversation about where we find ourselves today.
Are you sorry you’re ending your tenure as governor in this particular federal climate?
I am sorry about that, because I don’t think the world deserves someone as reckless as the current president. You know, it’s very nice to have a president or a president-elect ask you to think about being a cabinet secretary, and to ask you to be thought about as a vice president. That’s very flattering, but I think people made assumptions that I was really interested in pushing that, and these two [gestures at Schlegel and Coleman] can tell you unequivocally: I wasn’t leaving. I like this job, and I don’t feel like I’m done. I feel like I need six more years. And I tease that I lost three with COVID-19 and fires.
But I’m also really proud: No state in the nation has our cradle to career system. We did far better economically than anyone thought we could. I’ve always believed that we could punch above our weight class. I think COVID really stalled out a lot of our educational potential progress [but] I think we’re going to get there.
What about the Children, Youth and Families Department?
CYFD is one of those really hard ones. We need to do more. We have had some missteps. There’s no question about that, but nobody wants to work there. And the more that you try to take it over, the less that’s the case. We have some ideas that didn’t get over the finish line that we can implement anyway, and we’re going to do what the Legislature told us to do in a robust and cooperative manner. I wish it was an easier road to hoe. Maybe on a happier note, at CYFD, 200 or 300 foster kids and families were at the residence on Saturday, which is great, and we’re doing it. We are going to do a massive adoption effort and get lots of families all ready to go, and that’s really good news and exciting for these families and kids.
Your term doesn’t end for more than a year and a half, but do you know what you’re doing next?
I don’t quite know. I do want to work, and I think folks are expecting me to look at healthcare some more and look at energy. We really are a powerhouse, and we have the ability to do a lot more transition and green work, not just in the country, but around the world. I’m excited about that. [New Mexico is hosting the Western Governors Association in June] and we’re going to have a robust conversation. You cannot power the eastern United States without the western states. We’ll make a pitch. New Mexico can do a lot of different things.
This story originally published online at sourcenm.com and was reprinted with permission
