New Mexico fire fight tops $65 million as wildfires march on - By Susan Montoya Bryan Associated Press
Many homes near America's largest wildfire survived the latest barrage of howling winds and erratic flames, but New Mexico's governor said Tuesday the risk remains high and she expects long-term costs of recovering from the massive blaze to soar.
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham said during a briefing that she has not received any reports in recent days of widespread damage to homes amid the latest round of fierce winds that fanned the blaze and created challenges for firefighting crews.
Crews worked to shepherd the flames around homes that make up numerous small villages on the northern and southern ends of the fire by bulldozing lines, putting up sprinklers, clearing trees and raking pine needles. A force of nearly 1,800 firefighters and support personnel were assigned to the blaze, including elite hot shots and several special strike teams.
The cost of fighting the blaze has topped $50 million. While that's expected to grow with wind predicted through Wednesday, the governor said the cost to reconstruct homes, prevent post-fire flooding and restore the blackened forest once the flames are out will likely stretch into the billions of dollars.
"When you think about rebuilding communities, it is not an overnight process," Lujan Grisham said. "So we should be thinking in terms of significant resources and those resources in my view should largely be borne by the federal government given the situation."
The nearly 320-square-mile wildfire has burned some 300 structures, including homes, since it started last month. Some areas remain under evacuation orders, but authorities on Monday started letting some residents on the eastern flank return home.
A federal disaster already has been declared due to the blaze, which is partly the result of a preventative fire set in early April that escaped containment. The flames merged with a separate fire a couple of weeks later, and as of Tuesday the jagged perimeter stretched more than 356 miles.
The governor said anyone who didn't believe the federal government shouldn't accept significant liability would be in for a fight.
"It's negligent to consider a prescribed burn in the windy season in a state that is under an extreme drought warning," she said.
Members of New Mexico's congressional delegation and others have called for an investigation. While forest officials have yet to release planning documents related to the prescribed fire, they have said forecasted weather conditions were within parameters for the project.
Meanwhile, another blaze burning in New Mexico had prompted officials at Los Alamos National Laboratory and the nearby town to prepare for evacuations as a precaution.
Nearly 900 people were fighting that fire, with the price tag nearing $16 million on Tuesday.
The northeast portion of the fire slowed as it ran into greener vegetation that contained more moisture. Fuel also became sparse as it moved through the footprint of a 2011 blaze, resulting in much different fire behavior than the large blaze burning in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains.
Wind and low humidity levels continue to be big threats around the West as the National Weather Service issued red flag warnings for extreme fire danger in much of New Mexico and parts of Nevada, Arizona, Colorado and Texas. Forecasters said New Mexico is outpacing most other recent years for the number of red flag days in April and so far this month.
Crews also were battling smaller fires elsewhere in New Mexico and Arizona.
Governor promises a temporary halt to prescribed burns while wildfires rage in New Mexico – By Patrick Lohmann, Source New Mexico
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham said Tuesday that it was “negligent” for the United States Forest Service to ignite a prescribed burn in early April, and that she has received assurances that there will be no more prescribed burns in New Mexico in the short-term — at least not while fires continue to rage here.
“So no one has to worry about that. That’s been made very clear to our partners: We’re done,” she said. “And nothing happens except fighting these fires, and providing recovery assistance to New Mexicans.”
A Santa Fe National Forest crew on April 6 ignited what was supposed to be a 1,200-acre prescribed burn in Las Dispensas, south of Mora. It quickly jumped out of the burn area and caused the Hermits Peak wildfire, which has since merged with the Calf Canyon fire and burned more than 200,000 acres.
At a news briefing Tuesday, Lujan Grisham said she shares the anger felt by many New Mexicans about the prescribed burn gone awry. But she said it was an “earnest mistake,” one she expects the federal government to pay for in addition to federal disaster relief.
“For me, it’s negligent to consider a prescribed burn in a windy season, in a state that’s under an extreme drought warning statewide,” she said. “So I think that it is likely — likely – that Congress and most of our federal partners accept that there is significant federal liability.”
The federal Forest Service has said it is doing a review to determine what went wrong, but they have refused to provide documents or additional details about the decision to ignite the fire. A National Weather Service forecast prepared at forestry officials’ request predicted wind gusts on April 6 reaching 25 mph and humidity as low as 9%, according to records.
Lujan Grisham said she had not yet received any further clarity about decision-making the day the prescribed burn was ignited.
An expert and wildland firefighter, Tom Ribe, told Source New Mexico that it was “extremely risky” to ignite a prescribed burn on a windy April day in New Mexico. He also said the forecast conditions should have given a burn boss pause April 6, but he also stressed the decision to ignite a prescribed burn is a complex and difficult one based on many factors.
The Hermits Peak fire burned about 7,500 acres and was 91% contained by the time it merged with Calf Canyon. The combined megafire now has burned more than 200,000 acres, destroyed at least 166 structures and caused tens of thousands to flee their homes. The cause of the Calf Canyon fire is still being determined.
Lujan Grisham has previously called for changes to federal rules regarding prescribed burns, especially ones planned for the spring windy season in the Southwest.
New Mexico voting starts to pick GOP challenger for governor - Associated Press
Early voting started Tuesday across New Mexico ahead of the June 7 primary Election Day to determine the Republican nominee for governor and Democratic nominees for attorney general and other statewide offices.
Election officials began mailing absentee ballots to local voters and county clerk's offices opened their doors to in-person voting. Expanded early voting begins May 21 at more polling locations.
Five Republicans are vying for the nomination to challenge Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham as she seeks a second term. They include former television meteorologist Mark Ronchetti, state Rep. Rebecca Dow of Truth or Consequences and Sandoval County Commissioner Jay Block.
Democratic voters will select a nominee for the state's top law enforcement post as Attorney General Hector Balderas completes his second term and term limits prevent him from serving longer. Albuquerque-based District Attorney Raúl Torrez is competing against lawyer and State Auditor Brian Colón, who is also from Albuquerque. The winner will compete against Republican attorney and U.S. Marine veteran Jeremy Michael Gay of Gallup.
New Mexico requires affiliation with a major party in order to vote in a primary.
But recent changes in state election law make it easier for unaffiliated voters to participate in the primary if they chose to affiliate with a major party, even briefly.
Under same-day voter registration procedures, people who belong to minor parties or decline affiliation can still participate in the statewide primary by picking a major party affiliation on site at election-day polling places, county clerks' offices and some early voting locations.
State election regulators have said that the registration-update process can take as little as five minutes and is reversible after people vote in primaries.
People already registered to vote for major parties — Republican, Democratic or Libertarian — are prohibited from switching parties during the election period that lasts from Tuesday through June 7.
People who decline to state party preferences or belong to minor political parties account for nearly one-fourth of registered voters in New Mexico.
How to vote in the NM primary in a county affected by wildfire – By Shaun Griswold, Source New Mexico
Early voting for New Mexico’s primary elections starts today with a message of urgency for the thousands displaced by forest fires burning in their communities:
Vote now.
The Secretary of State’s Office is urging anyone who left their home due to fires and who wants to vote in the primary election to vote in person at a county clerk’s office or request an absentee ballot that can be mailed to their current location.
For the thousands displaced by the Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon fire in northern New Mexico, that location could be a shelter or a relative’s house, even out of state. According to the Secretary of State’s Office, as long as the absentee ballot application is submitted before June 2, a ballot will be delivered at the address they submit within two to three business days.
People do not have to change their voter registration information if they are requesting a ballot to be delivered to a place that is not their home address.
This primary election is “anything but a normal one,” Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver said .
Today — May 10 — is the first day ballots can be mailed to voters who have submitted an absentee application.
The Secretary of State’s Office is working with the U.S. Postal Service to coordinate the delivery of ballots that were printed and mailed out to people who have already fled their homes, according to spokesperson Alex Curtas.
It’s unclear at this moment exactly how many ballots were requested by voters who are no longer in their home or their residence. Curtas said the office knows the mail that cannot be delivered is sent to a nearby distribution center and held until it’s safe to deliver.
More information will be released in the coming days on how to safely get ballots in the hands of voters who submitted requests before they evacuated, he added.
The deadline to request a mail-in ballot is June 2. Primary Election Day is June 7.
Today is also the last day to register to vote in the primary election. New Mexico has a closed primary, so people must register with an affiliated party.
There is a new rule in place this year that allows independent voters to get a primary ballot as long as they switch parties and do so at an in-person voting site during early voting or on Eelection Day.
In-person voting is now open at county clerk’s offices around the state, and the fires already forced a shift in early voting operations for those most impacted in Mora County.
The Mora County Clerk’s Office moved 60 miles northwest to the Wagon Mound City Hall located at 600 Catron Avenue. The move is temporary, as the clerk’s official office is in the middle of the evacuation zone from the Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon fire that destroyed homes and displaced thousands in the county.
The office will be open from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. and will also offer regular county services.
New Mexicans in Los Alamos, Taos and Sandoval counties are keeping an eye on the fires and could possibly see disruptions if the fires move closer to communities in the areas.
Toulouse Oliver said San Miguel County voting operations are also in a standby, and voters are encouraged to participate “as soon as possible in case the fire situation changes and causes disruption to county services, as has happened in Mora County.”
Court hearing: Did Biden legally suspend oil lease sales? - By Janet Mcconnaughey Associated Press
President Joe Biden legally called for suspending new and gas lease sales while considering their effect on climate change, and onshore and offshore sales were legally postponed, a federal attorney argued Tuesday.
The current offshore lease sale plan states specifically that the U.S. Secretary of the Interior "may reduce or cancel lease offerings on account of climate change," Department of Justice attorney Andrew B. Bernie told a 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel.
Land-based sales "were not postponed by the executive order. They were postponed because of a need to comply with NEPA" — the National Environmental Policy Act, he said.
Arguing for 13 states that challenged Biden's January 2021 order, Louisiana Deputy Solicitor General Joseph Scott St. John said laws passed in response to the 1970s oil crisis require lease sales.
The Biden administration failed to "grapple with prior analyses" of the planned sales to give a valid reason for postponing or canceling them, he said.
Judges James L. Dennis, Patrick E. Higginbotham and James E. Graves Jr. did not indicate when they will rule.
Louisiana is joined in the suit by Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah and West Virginia.
The state challenge to Biden's order has not yet gone to trial but a federal judge blocked the order in a preliminary injunction, writing that since the laws did not state the president could suspend oil lease sales, only Congress could do so.
Bernie said, "It is routine for individual lease sales or proposed lease sales not to be held for various reasons." The federal brief said nine five-year leasing plans have been approved and all had fewer sales than originally scheduled.
"We don't know why prior lease sales were withdrawn," St. John responded. "Presumably there was some kind of rationale. That was not the case here."
U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty found that states which challenged the order were likely to prove the Interior Department violated the Administrative Policy Act by acting without "any rational explanation."
After Doughty ruled for the states, the Interior Department held an offshore lease sale, which a federal judge in Washington canceled. Four onshore lease sales are scheduled next month — for land in Nevada on June 14; New Mexico, Oklahoma and Colorado on June 16; Wyoming on June 22 and Utah, Montana and North Dakota on June 28.
However, the administration scaled back the amount of land originally on offer and raised royalty rates 50% from 12.5% to 18.75%. That's the amount usually charged for desirable deep water offshore leases, while those in less than 656 feet of water are charged the 12.5% minimum.
Biden has come under pressure to increase U.S. crude production as fuel prices spike because of the coronavirus pandemic and the war in Ukraine. From within his own party, the Democrat faces calls to do more to curb emissions from fossil fuels that are driving climate change.
Oil companies have been reluctant to ramp up, saying there are not enough workers, scant money for new drilling investments and wariness that today's high prices won't last.
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Associated Press writer Matt Brown in Billings, Montana, contributed to this report.
Wind is wild card in fires burning in New Mexico, Arizona - By Cedar Attanasio And Susan Montoya Bryan Associated Press
Schoolchildren in a northern New Mexico community that had been threatened by a wildfire were expected to resume in-person classes Tuesday while residents on the fire's northern edges remained under evacuation orders.
The West Las Vegas School District said exceptions would be made for students still displaced by what's the largest wildfire burning in the U.S. or those whose health has been affected by the smoke.
Meanwhile, firefighters worked in rugged terrain ahead of the massive blaze trying to clear brush and stop the flames from burning more homes in the Rocky Mountain foothills.
The wildfire — intensified by decades of drought, warmer temperatures and spring winds — has charred 308 square miles of tinder-dry ponderosa forests. Thousands of people have had to flee the flames and some 300 structures, including homes, have been destroyed.
Crews have spent days working to protect ranch homes scattered through the area and stamping out small fires that jumped ahead of the main blaze.
"So far they've had great luck in catching those," said fire information officer Joel Barnett.
Wind will continue to be a factor this week, along with low humidity, but to varying degrees depending on the day. Fire officials predicted part of the massive blaze would push north into rugged terrain that is difficult for firefighters to access.
"This isn't a surprise to us. All the models showed this probably was going to happen," said fire operations section chief Todd Abel.
The region's largest population center — Las Vegas, New Mexico, home to 13,000 people — remained largely safe from the flames. Some residents were allowed to return over the weekend.
Early Monday, West Las Vegas High School was empty but for a single instructor teaching remotely. Schools in the district pivoted to remote learning, something they had planned as a contingency in case of a rise in coronavirus cases.
"I've been preparing, not for wildfire, but for something like this," said mass media teacher Kenneth Bachicha.
Elsewhere in northern New Mexico, a wildfire near the federal government's key facilities for nuclear research prompted Los Alamos National Laboratory and others in the area to begin preparing for evacuations. Officials stressed that there was no immediate threat to the lab itself.
That fire has burned nearly 64 square miles.
Officials said some medically fragile residents and large animals already have been moved out of the area to lessen the traffic congestion should evacuations be ordered. They anticipated residents would have at least a day or two notice if they need to flee.
"If the fire gets its fifth gear, it will be here sooner than we want it to be," said incident commander Rich Harvey. "We're doing everything we can to check it."
Crews in Arizona were dealing with strong winds Monday as they battled a fire near the U.S.-Mexico border that forced several dozen people from their homes.
Court hearing: Did Biden legally suspend oil lease sales? By Janet Mcconnaughey Associated Press
A federal appeals court in New Orleans hears arguments Tuesday about whether President Joe Biden legally suspended new oil and gas lease sales shortly after taking office because of climate change worries.
The case has not been tried but a federal judge blocked the order, saying only Congress could suspend the sales.
Federal lawyers say the government has broad power to hold, cancel or defer lease sales.
Biden's order was "a straightforward articulation of the President's views as to how Interior should use the ample discretion Congress has granted the agency," Andrew M. Bernie and other attorneys wrote.
U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty in Monroe had no authority to review Biden's order because the president is not an "agency" subject to the Administrative Procedure Act, they wrote.
Doughty found that states which challenged the order were likely to prove that the Interior Department violated that law by acting arbitrarily and without giving "any rational explanation." He also found that since laws governing the lease sales don't say the president can "pause" them, only Congress may do so.
Lawyers for Louisiana and a dozen other states say a 1987 law setting out how to sell oil and gas leases requires such sales at least four times a year in states with eligible land.
"But with the stroke of a pen just a week after he took his oath of office, President Biden put his campaign promises above federal law: By executive fiat, he halted oil and gas leasing on federal lands," said the brief by attorneys led be Louisiana Solicitor General Elizabeth B. Murrill, the top constitutional lawyer in the Louisiana Attorney General's Office.
Louisiana is joined in the suit by Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah and West Virginia
After Doughty ruled for the states, the Interior Department held an offshore lease sale — which a federal judge in Washington canceled. Four onshore lease sales are scheduled next month — for land in Nevada on June 14; New Mexico, Oklahoma and Colorado on June 16; Wyoming on June 22 and Utah, Montana and North Dakota on June 28.
However, the administration scaled back the amount of land originally on offer and raised royalty rates 50 percent from 12.5% to 18.75%. That's the amount charged for desirable deep water offshore leases, while those in less than 656 feet of water are charged the 12.5% minimum.
Biden has come under pressure to increase U.S. crude production as fuel prices spike because of the coronavirus pandemic and war in Ukraine. From within his own party, the Democrat faces calls to do more to curb emissions from fossil fuels that are driving climate change.
Oil companies have been reluctant to ramp up, saying there are not enough workers, scant money for new drilling investments and wariness that today's high prices won't last.
New Mexico releases draft plan to address education lawsuit - By Cedar Attanasio Associated Press / Report For America
New Mexico officials have released a draft plan to address an ongoing education lawsuit brought by underserved K-12 students, and education advocates and tribal leaders are expected to comb through the document in the coming days.
The New Mexico Public Education Department says it's looking for feedback on the plan, which is intended to address a 2018 state court ruling that has dominated education policy and funding discussions among state lawmakers ever since.
In 2018, the court concluded the state has fallen short of its constitutional duty to provide an "adequate" education, at least to some 70% of K-12 students, including Native Americans, English learners, and those who come from low-income families or have disabilities. The court said students had unequal access to qualified teachers, quality school buildings, and other lessons that engage them tailored to their cultural background and needs.
The 55-page "Martinez/Yazzie Discussion Draft Action Plan" is named for the mothers of students who sued the state separately, and combined in a lawsuit in 2015. The draft plan outlines targets for improving the diversity of teachers by 20%, increasing graduation rates by 15%, and increasing reading and math proficiency by 50% for groups identified in the lawsuit by 2025, compared to 2019 levels.
It also catalogs changes the administration has made so far, including major salary raises for teachers, and improved social studies standards.
"The Martinez/Yazzie Discussion Draft Action Plan is not just a plan for the future; it also reflects all the work that's taken place since the beginning of this administration, and it challenges all of us with strong performance targets to move the needle on key student outcomes," said Secretary of Education Kurt Steinhaus.
In 2020, a state judge denied a request by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham to dismiss the lawsuit. The same judge ruled in 2021 that many of the vulnerable students weren't being provided computers and internet sufficient for them to participate in remote learning, despite efforts by education officials to deploy Wi-Fi hot spots and secure laptops for many students.
The education department had promised to release the draft in December, before the state Legislature's annual meeting that determines education funding, but didn't do so, to the chagrin of tribal leaders. The budgets passed earlier this year.
1 in 3 fears immigrants influence US elections: AP-NORC poll By Anita Snow Associated Press
With anti-immigrant rhetoric bubbling over in the leadup to this year's critical midterm elections, about 1 in 3 U.S. adults believes an effort is underway to replace U.S.-born Americans with immigrants for electoral gains.
About 3 in 10 also worry that more immigration is causing U.S.-born Americans to lose their economic, political and cultural influence, according to a poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Republicans are more likely than Democrats to fear a loss of influence because of immigration, 36% to 27%.
Those views mirror swelling anti-immigrant sentiment espoused on social media and cable TV, with conservative commentators like Tucker Carlson exploiting fears that new arrivals could undermine the native-born population.
In their most extreme manifestation, those increasingly public views in the U.S. and Europe tap into a decades-old conspiracy theory known as the "great replacement," a false claim that native-born populations are being overrun by nonwhite immigrants who are eroding, and eventually will erase, their culture and values. The once-taboo term became the mantra of one losing conservative candidate in the recent French presidential election.
"I very much believe that the Democrats — from Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi, all the way down — want to get the illegal immigrants in here and give them voting rights immediately," said Sally Gansz, 80. Actually, only U.S. citizens can vote in state and federal elections, and attaining citizenship typically takes years.
A white Republican, Gansz has lived her whole life in Trinidad, Colorado, where about half of the population of 8,300 identifies as Hispanic, most with roots going back centuries to the region's Spanish settlers.
"Isn't it obvious that I watch Fox?" quipped Gansz, who said she watches the conservative channel almost daily, including the top-rated Fox News Channel program "Tucker Carlson Tonight," a major proponent of those ideas.
"Demographic change is the key to the Democratic Party's political ambitions," Carlson said on the show last year. "In order to win and maintain power, Democrats plan to change the population of the country."
Those views aren't held by a majority of Americans — in fact, two-thirds feel the country's diverse population makes the U.S. stronger, and far more favor than oppose a path to legal status for immigrants brought into the U.S. illegally as children. But the deep anxieties expressed by some Americans help explain how the issue energizes those opposed to immigration.
"I don't feel like immigration really affects me or that it undermines American values," said Daniel Valdes, 43, a registered Democrat who works in finance for an aeronautical firm on Florida's Space Coast. "I'm pretty indifferent about it all."
Valdes' maternal grandparents came to the U.S. from Mexico, and he said he has "tons" of relatives in the border city of El Paso, Texas. He has Puerto Rican roots on his father's side.
While Republicans worry more than Democrats about immigration, the most intense anxiety was among people with the greatest tendency for conspiratorial thinking. That's defined as those most likely to agree with a series of statements, like much of people's lives is "being controlled by plots hatched in secret places" and "big events like wars, recessions, and the outcomes of elections are controlled by small groups of people who are working in secret against the rest of us."
In all, 17% in the poll believe both that native-born Americans are losing influence because of the growing population of immigrants and that a group of people in the country is trying to replace native-born Americans with immigrants who agree with their political views. That number rises to 42% among the quarter of Americans most likely to embrace other conspiracy theories.
Alex Hoxeng, 37, a white Republican from Midland, Texas, said he found those most extreme versions of the immigration conspiracies "a bit far-fetched" but does believe immigration could lessen the influence of U.S.-born Americans.
"I feel like if we are flooded with immigrants coming illegally, it can dilute our culture," Hoxeng said.
Teresa Covarrubias, 62, rejects the idea that immigrants are undermining the values or culture of U.S.-born Americans or that they are being brought in to shore up the Democratic voter base. She is registered to vote but is not aligned with any party.
"Most of the immigrants I have seen have a good work ethic, they pay taxes and have a strong sense of family," said Covarrubias, a second grade teacher in Los Angeles whose four grandparents came to the U.S. from Mexico. "They help our country."
Republican leaders, including border governors Doug Ducey of Arizona and Greg Abbott of Texas — who is running for reelection this year — have increasingly decried what they call an "invasion," with conservative politicians traveling to the U.S.-Mexico border to pose for photos alongside former President Donald Trump's border wall.
Vulnerable Democratic senators up for election this year in Arizona, Georgia, New Hampshire and Nevada have joined many Republicans in calling on the Biden administration to wait on lifting the coronavirus-era public health rule known as Title 42 that denies migrants a chance to seek asylum. They fear it could draw more immigrants to the border than officials can handle.
U.S. authorities stopped migrants more than 221,000 times at the Mexican border in March, a 22-year high, creating a fraught political landscape for Democrats as the Biden administration prepares to lift Title 42 authority May 23. The pandemic powers have been used to expel migrants more than 1.8 million times since it was invoked in March 2020 on the grounds of preventing the spread of COVID-19.
Newly arrived immigrants are barred from voting in federal elections because they aren't citizens, and gaining citizenship is an arduous process that can take a decade or more — if they are successful. In most cases, they must first obtain permanent residency, then wait five more years before they can apply for citizenship.
Investigations have failed to turn up evidence of widespread voting by people who aren't eligible, including by non-citizens. For example, a Georgia audit of its voter rolls completed this year found fewer than 2,000 instances of non-citizens attempting to register and vote over the last 25 years, none of which succeeded.
Blake Masters, a candidate for Senate in Arizona, is among the Republicans running for office this year who have played into anxieties about a changing population.
"What the left really wants to do is change the demographics of this country," he said in a video recorded in October. "They want to do that so they can consolidate power so they can never lose another election."
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The AP-NORC poll of 4,173 adults was conducted Dec. 1-23, 2021, using a combined sample of interviews from NORC's probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population, and interviews from opt-in online panels. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 1.96 percentage points. The AmeriSpeak panel is recruited randomly using address-based sampling methods, and respondents later were interviewed online or by phone.
Joshua Cohen and the late Winfred Rembert win arts Pulitzers - By Hillel Italie AP National Writer
Raven Chacon has won the Pulitzer Prize in music for his composition for organ and ensemble, "Voiceless Mass."
Chacon is a Diné composer, performer and installation artist from the Navajo Nation. He’s a graduate of the University of New Mexico and the California Institute of the Arts, and is scheduled to start a residency at the Pew Center for Arts and Heritage in Philadelphia later this year.
His solo artworks have been displayed at the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Smithsonian Institute's American Art Museum and National Museum of the American Indian, and many more.
3 found dead in Albuquerque parking lot in murder-suicide - Associated Press
Police say a man shot and killed two teenage cousins before turning the gun on himself in Albuquerque yesterday, in what appears to be a murder-suicide.
Officers responded to reports of a person shooting themself in the parking lot of a Party City store at around 12:30 yesterday afternoon.
When they arrived, officers discovered a 53-year-old man and two 16 year-olds had been shot. Despite administering CPR and other efforts, all three were pronounced dead at the scene.
Police identified the teens as Alexia Rael and her cousin, Mario Salgado-Rosales. The adult was identified as Bradley Wallin.
Homicide detectives say they learned during the preliminary investigation that Wallin had previously been in a relationship with the mother of Alexia Rael.
They say she had filed a temporary restraining order against Wallin last month and a hearing for a permanent restraining order had been scheduled for later this month.
They say the woman filed a temporarily restraining order against Wallin last month and a hearing for a permanent restraining order had been scheduled for later this month.
Appeals court sides with Carlsbad police in YouTuber lawsuit - Associated Press
A federal appeals court has rejected a YouTuber's claims that a Carlsbad police officer falsely arrested him and violated his civil rights.
The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday upheld a lower court ruling dismissing a lawsuit filed in 2020 by Albert Bustillos against the city of Carlsbad.
Bustillos records police encounters for his Stray Dog The Exposer YouTube channel. In October 2019, he filmed Carlsbad police officers handcuffing a woman experiencing an "altered mental status" and running into traffic.
Officer Daniel Vasquez ordered Bustillos to leave because his presence was agitating the woman, according to court documents. When Bustillos refused to leave or show his I.D., Vasquez handcuffed him. He was released a few minutes later when he displayed an I.D.
Vasquez, now a sergeant, was named in the lawsuit.
The appellate court ruled that Vasquez had probable cause to request Bustillos' I.D. and to arrest him. Bustillos' "desire to film from a particular location does not authorize him to break the law," the court wrote.
Bustillos also filed a similar lawsuit in 2020 against the Artesia Police Department.
Shooting death of Santa Fe officer's son under AG review - Santa Fe New Mexican, Associated Press
Almost six months after a Santa Fe police officer's 2-year-old son was accidentally shot and killed in his home, state prosecutors are conducting an investigation into possible charges.
The Santa Fe New Mexican reported Sunday the New Mexico Attorney General's Office confirmed they're in the process of an independent review.
Jerri Mares, a spokeswoman for the attorney general, said they are following the process when asked if the involvement of a police officer was impacting the pace.
The Dec. 8 shooting in officer Jonathan Harmon's Rio Rancho home occurred while Harmon was still in bed and his wife was tending to their newborn in another bedroom.
Harmon's 4-year-old son climbed onto a kitchen counter to get to a cabinet, according to an incident report. He found Harmon's off-duty gun and accidentally discharged it, striking 2-year-old Lincoln.
Harmon has not faced any charges and remains on administrative duty with Santa Fe police. Deputy Chief Ben Valdez says the department will conduct its own investigation after Rio Rancho police finish theirs.
Sandoval County District Attorney Barbara Romo requested the Attorney General's Office's assistance in March. She cited a conflict of interest because of Harmon's previous job with Bernalillo police. He often worked in her office.
The Attorney General's Office released records tied to the case that the city of Rio Rancho previously withheld. The New Mexican and the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government had sued in March to obtain police reports, 911 audio and other materials under public records law.