Cities respond to Trump’s sanctuary threats as judge extends protection from threatened cuts - Tim Henderson, Stateline via Source New Mexico
More cities and states have responded to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi’s threat to prosecute them over so-called sanctuary policies limiting law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration enforcement — some by thumbing their noses, at least one by acquiescing.
Written responses defending sanctuary policies have been sent to Bondi from cities including Albuquerque, New Mexico; Boston; Hoboken, New Jersey; Portland, Oregon; and Seattle, along with the states of California, Connecticut, Minnesota, Oregon and Washington. Many noted that courts so far have upheld their right to limit cooperation with deportations. In Albuquerque’s letter, Mayor Tim Keller called Bondi’s claim that the city’s policies “thwart federal immigration enforcement to the detriment” of the U.S. “baseless.”
“Pam Bondi seeks to have Washington state bend the knee to a Trump administration that, day by day, drags us closer to authoritarianism. That’s not going to happen,” Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson, a Democrat, said in an Aug. 19 news conference.
Louisville, Kentucky, is one city that agreed to more cooperation after a confrontation over the issue — before Bondi threatened prosecution in August, but after the attorney general said she had issued a “strong written warning” to the city.
The city had stopped complying in 2017 with so-called detainer requests to hold jailed residents for immigration authorities, but leaders resumed cooperation to avoid being targeted for more raids.
“Cities on the sanctuary city list right now are experiencing a terrifying increase in raids by ICE, including mass raids,” Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg, a Democrat, said in a July 22 statement. “I’ve talked with leaders within our immigrant community before I made this decision. I heard their fears loud and clear about current federal policies and ICE actions. I also heard that they want Louisville off the federal sanctuary city list.”
Bondi issued a revised list of sanctuary cities, counties and states in August.
Rochester, New York, meanwhile, in August amended its municipal code to strengthen its policies against cooperation by adding disciplinary measures for personnel who violate the policy. State Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat, had earlier supported the city’s existing policies in court, saying in a statement that they “keep communities safe and allow local law enforcement to use resources to address local public safety priorities.”
In Boston, Democratic Mayor Michelle Wu’s response letter accused the Trump administration of “false and continuous attacks” as part of a campaign to “divide, isolate, and intimidate our cities, and make Americans fearful of one another.”
U.S. District Court Judge William Orrick issued a new order Aug. 22 extending a preliminary injunction to more cities, counties and states that had asked for protection against President Donald Trump’s executive orders and agency directives. Trump sought to withhold unrelated federal funding based on similar sanctuary policies.
Orrick’s ruling found the orders and directives are likely to be unconstitutional violations of local rights to set limits on immigration enforcement cooperation.
The injunction covers 50 areas in 14 states: California, Connecticut, Colorado, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Washington and Wisconsin.
Trump administration lawyers asked Aug. 26 to dismiss the case, arguing that the administration’s actions so far “merely instruct agencies to assess federal grant programs to determine where they can lawfully add immigration related conditions.”
A hearing is scheduled Oct.22.
Retired State Police lieutenant faces drug trafficking charges - Colleen Heild, Albuquerque Journal
Carlos Antonio Perea got into a new line of work after retiring as a lieutenant with the New Mexico State Police.
Federal court records allege he turned to a life of crime as an employee of a drug cartel and hoped he could improve illicit trafficking operations with the skills he learned in law enforcement.
But at the time of his arrest on Aug. 5, Perea hadn’t yet told his employer, a purported cartel-related drug trafficking organization, that he was a former police officer, according to a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Albuquerque.
His account was detailed in a criminal complaint filed by a State Police task force officer who caught Perea allegedly transporting numerous large packages of fentanyl pills. Perea and passenger Catherine Anne Schmidt were arrested after an early morning traffic stop on eastbound Interstate 40 in Cibola County, court records state.
Perea and Schmidt were indicted Tuesday by a federal grand jury in Albuquerque on felony charges of possession with intent to distribute 400 grams or more of fentanyl, and conspiracy.
Perea was released to an Albuquerque halfway house pending resolution of the criminal case. Schmidt was to enter in-patient treatment for 90 days.
Attorneys for Perea and Schmidt could not be reached Friday.
Perea, 55, retired from State Police in 2019 as a lieutenant with the agency’s Commercial Vehicle Enforcement unit. A State Police spokesman said Perea started with the agency in 2006.
The arresting officer, Julian Armijo, wrote in a criminal complaint that he had noticed the vehicle swerve in the right lane of traffic and cross “the white fog line” on the roadway, so he decided to pull the vehicle over. Armijo was assigned as a task force officer with the Department of Homeland Security Investigations at the time.
Once stopped, Perea told Armijo he was a former State Police lieutenant, but had lost his driver’s license. Perea said he and Schmidt were traveling back to Albuquerque after looking at houses and property to buy in Arizona for three days. Schmidt had a different story, relating that they were “just visiting” in Arizona for two days.
A State Police K-9 on the scene did a “free air sniff” of the vehicle, alerting to the odor of drugs, prompting the search that turned up the drugs. Later, Armijo and another State Police officer discovered two “extremely heavy” spare tires in the trunk of the sedan, which later turned out to be filled with a total of 63.79 kilograms of fentanyl pills.
Armijo said that Perea agreed to be interviewed after his arrest.
After retiring from the State Police, he went to work for ABF Freight System Inc., the complaint states.
Perea stated that “he often would imagine how easy it would have been for him to transport drugs using his ABF business vehicle, because he traveled frequently between Albuquerque and Phoenix.”
It wasn’t clear from the complaint if Perea still worked for the freight company. The Journal couldn’t reach company representatives about his status on Friday.
At some point, Perea began making multiple trips to California, Phoenix and Roswell transporting drugs, the complaint stated. He didn’t usually know what type of drugs he was transporting, “but knew his activities were illegal.”
For normal pickups or dropoffs, the complaint states, he and Schmidt would be instructed to leave their car at a specified location. When they returned later, the car would be loaded with drugs and they would drive back to a local park in Albuquerque where the car would be unloaded by another person or persons.
“Perea indicated that his previous experience, skills and knowledge of police work aided him in his ability to transport drugs successfully and undetected,” the complaint states.
“Perea indicated that he had not told his employer (drug trafficking organization), whom he believed to be cartel-related, that he was a former police officer,” according to the complaint.
However, he told investigators he intended “on doing so to suggest methods on improving their trafficking operations.”
State court records show at the time of his arrest on federal charges, Perea was awaiting trial in state district court in Valencia County on a charge of possession of a controlled substance (methamphetamine).
Last September, Perea was arrested for concealing his identity during a traffic stop, but the case was dismissed. In 2023, Perea went to a diversion program after being arrested on a charge of possession of fentanyl.
In June 2023, Perea was charged with shoplifting at the Big R store on the Santa Ana Pueblo, but that charge was dismissed by prosecutors.
Settlement released in Texas v. New Mexico Rio Grande lawsuit - Danielle Prokop, Source New Mexico
Parties in a legal dispute over Rio Grande water filed settlement documents Friday that could end a lawsuit that has been mired before the U.S. Supreme Court for the last 12 years and cost taxpayers tens of millions of dollars.
The potential dismissal of the case would establish new rules in the stretch of Rio Grande below Elephant Butte, an area reshaped by water scarcity and agriculture.
The U.S. Supreme Court in June 2024 struck a previous proposed settlement crafted between New Mexico, Texas and Colorado, ruling in a 5-4 decision that the settlement unfairly excluded the federal government’s “unique federal interests,” and sent the parties back to the negotiation tables in 2024.
In May, New Mexico, Texas, Colorado and the United States announced they were close to a settlement.
The agreement released Friday will provide a measure of stability and truly end the conflict, New Mexico’s lead attorney in the case, Jeff Wechsler, told Source NM.
“I think it’s a fair and appropriate resolution of a number of longstanding disputes in the Rio Grande, and I’m hopeful that it will really be the foundation for continued water use and prosperity in the region in both states,” he said.
The parties provided the settlement to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit Chief Judge D. Brooks Smith, who oversees the case as a special master. Smith set a Sept. 29 hearing in Philadelphia to consider the proposal. Following the hearing, Smith will write a recommendation to the U.S. Supreme Court, which holds the power to issue a final decision.
A series of droughts in the early 2000s spurred a slew of lawsuits between irrigation districts, local governments, state agencies and the federal Bureau of Reclamation over the splitting of the Rio Grande. The grievances carried into a 2011 federal lawsuit brought by New Mexico, which alleged the federal government’s operations of a network of dams, canals and irrigation ditches favored Texas farmers and shorted New Mexico its rightful Rio Grande water.
In 2013, Texas elevated the dispute to the U.S. Supreme Court, and alleged that New Mexico’s groundwater pumping from farming and development on the Rio Grande was taking tens of thousands of acre feet of water and violating the 87-year old compact between the states. The Supreme Court allowed the federal government to join the case in 2019.
In addition to the named parties, more than a dozen organizations factor into the case, including the cities of Las Cruces and El Paso; water utilities; farming groups; New Mexico State University and irrigation districts.
The four-part settlement resolves an overlapping series of disputes between:
- Texas and New Mexico, by establishing a framework for water accounting; and a new formula for yearly targets, among other provisions;
- New Mexico, the federal government and irrigation districts, which resolves water accounting issues and allows for transfers of water between the two irrigation districts for compact compliance;
- New Mexico and federal government, thus ending claims that New Mexico pumping threatened the federal government’s responsibility to transfer water to Mexico and the irrigation district; and requiring New Mexico to cut groundwater pumping under a new plan;
- and between the U.S. and the Elephant Butte Irrigation District, allowing for Rio Grande water to be used for purposes outside irrigation, while establishing compensation for farmers.
“This historic settlement allows New Mexico to maintain control of our water uses and adds flexibility to how we are able to meet our Compact requirements,” State Engineer Elizabeth Anderson said in a statement. “By working together with the local water users, the other states and the federal government, we have crafted a solution that meets the needs of all the parties.”
Wechsler said the key sign off from two regional irrigation districts — Elephant Butte Irrigation District and El Paso County Water Improvement District No. 1 — allows for groundwater users to continue using water.
“It really ends up being a huge benefit for the cities, the farmers, the water users down there,” Wechsler said.
Local unions, progressives draw thousands for protests in NM - Noah Alcala Bach, Albuquerque Journal
On Monday morning, thousands marched through Downtown Albuquerque, voicing their opposition to President Donald Trump at the “Workers over Billionaires” protest.
“We are the true patriots standing out here fighting for this country,” Eithne Johnson, a protester in attendance, said.
The local protest was in line with hundreds of others across the country, which were led by unions and other progressive organizations.
“It’s a travesty of democracy and justice. Everything that they’re (the Trump administration) doing is just antithetical to what the United States should be standing for,” Eric Schaefer, another protester, said.
The local Teamsters, communications, teachers, graduate workers and trade unions, the Party for Socialism and Liberation, the Democratic Socialists of America and the Southwestern Coalition for Palestine were among the organizers of the Albuquerque demonstration.
“I think a lot of times, people think that Labor Day is a day that they get to spend time at home, right with their families,” Sarah Hager, membership and involvement vice president for the Albuquerque Teachers Federation, said. “But I walked behind a family today with four little girls, and I just thought, what a wonderful way to spend time with your family.”
According to a joint social media post from ATF and other organizers, over 6,000 people attended the protest. The New Mexico Republican Party did not provide comment.
For its part, the White House put out a proclamation ahead of the weekend, signed Thursday by Trump, that pledged “to protect American jobs and defend the dignity of American labor.”
“Tragically, in recent decades, a corrupt political class allowed our manufacturing base to decline,” the proclamation reads. “Our jobs were shipped to distant shores, our industries decimated, and our communities weakened, all while building up foreign competitors at the expense of American workers and families.”
Ready for the New Mexico State Fair? Here's what to expect - Elizabeth Secor, Albuquerque Journal
Grab a turkey leg and pick your favorite pig race contestant, the New Mexico State Fair is returning for 11 days of fun, food and farm animals.
Dan Mourning, general manager of Expo New Mexico and the New Mexico State Fair, said there’s “a little bit of something for everyone.”
“There’s so many different moving parts or so many things that draw people together,” Dan Mourning, general manager of Expo New Mexico and the New Mexico State Fair, said. “That’s why 520,000 people show up for this fair every year.”
Mourning said the state fair, which runs Thursday, Sept. 4, through Sunday, Sept. 14, has an atmosphere that gets people excited.
“It’s energetic, it’s uplifting,” Mourning said.
“Everything that we do out there is just, you can’t even see it in one day. There’s so much entertainment, it’s just a great celebration in a really safe environment.”
He said that the New Mexico State Fair is one of the safest fairs in the United States in terms of security and technology.
“When you’re comfortable, you feel good, you come out with your friends, your family, your neighbors,” Mourning said. “And it’s a great time for us, especially in the times that we’re living in, to come together and be happy and celebrate those things that make us great as a state.”
Alongside an emphasis on security, the fair also has a focus on affordability.
“We understand what it takes to make a living out there. We don’t want people to miss the fair because they can’t afford it,” Mourning said.
A ticket to the fair online starts at $10.50 and goes up to $40 for an all-access pass. The state fair will also host several discount days. Fairgoers will have the option of Park and Ride, departing from and returning to Coronado Center on Saturdays and Sundays.
The New Mexico State Fair will have new food and drink options this year, including items tailored for the 21 and over crowd.
“So we have not just one, but we have two state fair brews that will be sold exclusively at the fair,” Mourning said.
For those looking for a non-beer option or a nonalcoholic option, Mourning said this year the fair is bringing back a speakeasy at the Manuel Lujan Jr. Exhibit Complex.
“This is where you can get craft cocktails, mocktails, a little bit of entertainment,” Mourning said. “We kind of call it the adult sensory station.”
He said the speakeasy gives the older crowd an escape from the noise where they can listen to some comedy and jazz.
The fair features a wide variety of entertainment, including Break-A-Boyz, MegaMorph the Transforming Car and Buckets N Boards, which are all new this year.
A new musical event this year is Soundwave NM, Mourning said, a showcase for local bands inside Tingley Coliseum.
Another popular event that will be returning is the Green Chile Cheeseburger Challenge, where nine of the best restaurants around New Mexico will be competing, Mourning said.
That’s not the only cook-off on the menu — the Unique Food Contest takes place opening day and the high school culinary competition is also returning.
“These are your future chefs and cooks that are going to be serving our food up for many generations, and they are talented, so you ... definitely don’t want to miss that,” Mourning said.
Mourning said opportunities like Future Farmers of America and the culinary competition help boost future generations.
“We need to showcase the best of New Mexico, and that’s what the state fair does,” Mourning said, “and giving these young people that venue and that opportunity to showcase their talents is the reason we exist.”
“They are absolutely our future.”
Mourning said the diversity of the fair is what keeps people coming year after year.
“It’s one of those things that it may be livestock and agriculture on one hand, it could be the rides, it could be the concerts, it could be the rodeo, it could be the art,” Mourning said. “It’s the history, the culture. It’s the greatest event for New Mexico in New Mexico.”