Keller and Torrez

We've called the ABQ crime wave a political sinkhole and that's been pretty much on the mark lately. Here's what's happened:

--The decision by Gov. Lujan Grisham to deploy 50 state police officers in ABQ to help fight crime has been widely praised, but it's alienating her further from the conservative south. The Otero County Sheriff complains that his area now lacks state police manpower because of their temporary move to the big city and that crime is going up because of it. He points the finger directly at the Governor.

--BernCo District Attorney Raul Torrez is in open and often ugly warfare with the district court judges and the state's criminal defense lawyers. The war escalated with the DA's latest anti-judge ploy. He asked the NM Supreme Court to ignore the judges and have them abandon their plans to have him present felony cases before preliminary hearings presided over by the judges rather than the grand jury controlled by the prosecutor.

---ABQ Mayor Tim Keller, who had avoided criticizing the judiciary, has now joined Torres in the war by co-signing his letter to the high court concerning the preliminary hearings. Earlier Keller told the public the alleged killer of a UNM baseball player should have been behind bars and not on the streets because of prior criminal behavior, implicating the courts in the murder. But it turns out that DA Torrez had to fess up that he messed up the earlier charges against the alleged killer and fired the attorney he had handling the case.

Why Keller is going for the judge bashing is perplexing. Maybe the polls are pushing Torrez and him in that direction. But judging by the intense and often effective pushback they are getting from those they are attacking it's political folly in the long run.

Who will be next to be lured into the sinkhole? We can't say but its getting pretty crowded down there.

HEINRICH'S COUP

He took plenty of heat for his April vote in favor of making controversial former GOP lobbyist David Bernhardt the new Secretary of Interior, but Dem US Senator Martin Heinrich saw that vote pay off this week--at least for a year. The news:

Opponents of fracking in the Chaco Canyon region won a key victory this week when U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich secured a commitment from Interior Secretary David Bernhardt to put a year-long hold on any energy leasing within ten miles of the cultural site following his visit to Chaco Canyon Culture National Historical Park.

Heinrich's friends scoffed at speculation that he voted for Bernhardt because he would someday like to be Interior Secretary himself and get confirmed with GOP support. Perhaps. Heinrich said of the vote:

When I've had success with secretaries of Interior with whom I did not share the same value set with, it's when I can get them out of Washington, D.C., to see something on the ground, so you aren't arguing about dogma in some paragraph of policy.

Well, he brought Bernhardt to Chaco and got his year-long moratorium on energy leasing. Even his harshest environmental critics can't argue with that success.

TURNED TABLES

A reader writes of the trouble of former Gov. Susana Martinez chronicled here this week and notes recent activity of another former Governor--Dem Bill Richardson:

And now, tables and worms have turned and Bill Richardson has the street cred to endorse senatorial candidate Ben Ray Lujan, while, clearly,  most R's would rather have the shingles than Susana's endorsement.

Richardson, a longtime supporter of Lujan's, this month told the New Mexican he is endorsing the northern congressman. Lujan is opposed for the Dem Senate nod by Sec. of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver. As for the Republicans, they have no name players on the Senate field for Martinez or anyone else to endorse.

STILL A GREAT PLACE


We wrap it up with where we started--ABQ crime. Here's some equal time for the glass is half-full crowd from reader Dennis Trujillo:

Joe, despite the many vacant storefronts in ABQ's Nob Hill, it is still a great place to live and walk. I have noticed a police presence on the streets and along with the sidewalk cleaning patrol, things are looking up. Some new businesses are opening and hopefully this is a sign of things to come. I recently thought about a move after 25 plus years here but after doing some serious looking, Burque's weather, the Sandias, the Rio Grande walk/ride trails, the affordability and good friends made us want to stay. I originally came to get a PhD at UNM and stayed here--glad we did. Burque and Nob Hill are a great place to live!

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(c)NM POLITICS WITH JOE MONAHAN 2019