Sanchez

It is a long way off but the smart money now says the most likely match-up for the 2026 gubernatorial race will be Democrat Deb Haaland versus former GOP Lt. Governor John Sanchez.

Former Sec. of Interior Haaland launched her campaign for the Democratic nomination in February. 

Her main challenger is Bernalillo County District Attorney Sam Bregman, a colorful personality who overplayed his hand when he announced his candidacy on horseback and in full cowboy regalia. His urban background made that a bridge too far and he now has ground to make up.

The expected entry into the contest by conservative Democrat and former Las Cruces Mayor Ken Miyagishima will be another burden for Bregman as he battles his party's large progressive wing and as Miyagishima brings some intriguing ideas to the table.

This competition for the nonprogressive vote will give Haaland, 64, breathing room to polish her campaign which has been criticized for its low energy optics and ambiguous reasoning over why she wants to be Governor.

Sanchez, according to long-term reliable sources, is now expected to announce a candidacy (in June?) and would immediately become the front-runner for the GOP nomination. This would be his second time carrying the party banner. He snared the nomination way back in 2002 and then suffered a general election defeat at the hands of Bill Richardson.

A GOP consultant tracking it all tells us:

Sanchez sees an opening against Haaland who has not been tested in a statewide race and whose appeal could be blunted by her performance. His hope is that he can break through in his hometown of ABQ where Democrats have been landsliding the Republicans for so long and also chip away at Hispanic voters who revealed dissatisfaction with the Democrats in the November election. 

Republican insiders believe that Sanchez should have little trouble dispatching Republican hopeful and Rio Rancho Mayor Gregg Hull in next year's primary. Former Supreme Court Justice Judith Nakamura  is giving conflicting signals about making a run.

THE SANCHEZ ANGLE

Haaland

Sanchez, 62, ran successfully for Lt. Governor under Susana Martinez in 2010 and 2014. He has contacts in all of the state's counties, the ability to raise oil money plus his own personal fortune from his roofing business. 

The Martinez wing of the party has nothing but contempt for Sanchez but stopping him would be a formidable task especially since the possibility of a Trump endorsement of Sanchez looms large. During the 2020 campaign Trump named him as his Hispanic Prosperity Initiative chairman and praised him at a White House ceremony

Martinez, Nakamura et al. are on the outside looking in on Trump whose endorsement either publicly or quietly would go a long way toward Sanchez securing a big win at the GOP preprimary convention next March. That, in turn, would boost his momentum heading into the June primary.

We first covered Sanchez's possible entry into the '26 race in January including reporting on his past political travails. Since then signals and chatter that he is getting in have grown stronger with the crescendo building.

While Sanchez is hopeful he can turn around the stranded Republican ship, it remains a gargantuan task because of the party's historic decline here in the past decade. 

Sanchez is an affable personality with broad appeal in the GOP, probably making the nomination not much more than a lay up. Actually taking the state's seat of power away from the Democrats will be a longshot. But as Dylan sang: 

"When you ain't got nothing, you got nothing to lose." 

This is the Home of New Mexico Politics.