Bill that would have banned 'extremely dangerous weapons,' tightened dealer security, stalls - John Miller, Albuquerque Journal
A Senate bill that would have outlawed the sale of certain semi-automatic firearms capable of discharging dozens of rounds per minute and imposed new security measures on gun dealers has failed to move to the House floor, a lead sponsor of the legislation confirmed.
Sen. Debbie O’Malley, D-Albuquerque, told the Journal on Wednesday that the sweeping gun control bill, Senate Bill 17, stalled in the current 30-day session, which ends at noon Thursday.
"There’s so many bills, and they can get delayed because of, you know, a lot of questions, sadly,” she said. “But we’re not giving up.”
Rumors that SB 17 would not advance for consideration in the House began to circulate after the chamber's Judiciary Committee delayed a vote on the measure in a late-night hearing Monday that extended into the early hours of Tuesday morning.
"Over 500 New Mexicans are killed by guns every year, and every single year we find more assault weapons in the commission of a crime in New Mexico," said Rep. Andrea Romero, D-Santa Fe, who co-sponsored the bill, which passed the Senate with a 21-17 vote last week following hours of debate.
Romero called for additional time to review eight new amendments lawmakers filed for the bill, postponing a vote early Tuesday morning and casting doubt on whether SB 17 would move forward as the session entered its final days.
One of the proposed amendments sought to reconcile a conflict between federal law and the proposed legislation, which would have inadvertently restricted individuals from retrieving firearms stored at pawn shops.
"As drafted, Senate Bill 17 creates an unintended conflict that could limit a law-abiding citizen's ability to redeem their own personal property," said Tony Tanner, owner of T&R Trading in Gallup. "We look forward to continue working with the sponsors to resolve these issues."
Several members of the public who attended the late-night hearing spoke against the bill, arguing it imposed unfair restrictions on average citizens and added unreasonable new security measures for gun dealers, such as requiring the retention of up to two years of video surveillance to assist in the investigation of crimes, such as firearm thefts.
The bill would have required gun dealers to retain inventory records and implement new security measures, such as those required at cannabis dispensaries across the state.
"The video surveillance mandate alone could destroy my business," said Amanda Flores, a second-generation New Mexico gun dealer. "Requiring two years of video retention places an extreme burden on small businesses."
Sponsors of the bill said tightened security at gun shops was crucial to combatting illegal firearms trafficking, which several gun dealers said rarely involves their businesses, despite cases of break-ins at gun stores across the state.
Moms Demand Action and Students Demand Action counterprotested Second Amendment-rights groups at the Roundhouse as SB 17 moved through the session this year.
"SB 17 is a critical gun trafficking bill designed to stop the flow of trafficked guns, hold irresponsible gun dealers accountable, and keep the most dangerous weapons out of the hands of criminals and teenagers," reads a news release Moms Demand Action issued after the bill advanced out of the Senate last week.
Zachary Fort, president of the New Mexico Shooting Sports Association, echoed guns rights advocacy groups from across the country who have taken a hard line against firearms regulations, arguing that SB 17 would not have gotten to the heart of rising rates of gun violence across the U.S.
"We are firmly opposed to specific bans on specific firearms," he told the Journal in a phone interview Wednesday afternoon. "We strongly believe that accountability needs to be for the people who commit acts of violence. The best way to do that is to ... hold people accountable and not just kind of try to attempt to ban broad categories of firearms."
A Federal Assault Weapons Ban enacted by Congress in 1994 expired in 2004, leaving the question to states, several of which have outlawed specific types of high-firepower semi-automatic weapons, including Washington, D.C.
O'Malley said despite the uphill battle SB 17 faced this session that she will try again in the future.
"I don't feel we can give up," she said. "I really feel like we need to do it on behalf of our communities and children, families."
News Editor Matthew Reisen contributed to this report.
Lawmakers pass budget, revive 1% raises as session nears end - Dan Boyd, Albuquerque Journal
With the clock ticking toward adjournment, New Mexico lawmakers on Wednesday put the final touches on a $11.1 billion spending plan and a tax package that would provide $10,000 tax credits to doctors practicing in the state.
In a final flurry of lawmaking before the 30-day session ends Thursday at noon, the House moved to restore a 1% pay raise for state employees and teachers that had been stripped out of the budget bill by a Senate committee.
The raises were affixed to a tax bill, Senate Bill 151, that won final approval late Wednesday, when the Senate voted to agree with House changes to the legislation.
"They are necessary to help working families keep up with the rapidly increasing cost of living today," said Rep. Derrick Lente, D-Sandia Pueblo, after a House Taxation and Revenue Committee meeting.
The raises were affixed to a tax bill, Senate Bill 151, that won final approval late Wednesday, when the Senate voted to agree with House changes to the legislation.
Dozens of other bills were also approved Wednesday, including a $11.1 billion budget bill that would increase state spending by about $277 million — or 2.6% — over current levels.
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham will have until March 11 to act on the budget bill and all other measures passed in the final days of this year's session.
The governor lauded legislators on Wednesday for passing some of her top legislative priorities, including a hotly debated medical malpractice bill and a measure codifying her universal child care initiative in state law.
The medical malpractice bill, which is aimed at stabilizing rising insurance premiums and improving health care access, was approved late Wednesday by the Senate following a bipartisan vote to strip out amendments that critics said had weakened the legislation.
At a glance:
With the 30-day session set to end at noon on Thursday, here's a look at where things stand at the Roundhouse.
What's been approved:
- Medical malpractice changes.
- Codifying universal child care in state law.
- Barring troops from polling places.
What's still pending:
- Changes to youthful serious offender definition.
- Local government funding lifeline for counties with ICE facilities.
- Narrowing of law barring firearms from polling places.
"This is a giant step toward solving our doctor shortage in New Mexico, and it's going to lead to better health outcomes for patients because they won't have to wait so long to see a doctor," said Lujan Grisham, who had previously vowed to call lawmakers back to Santa Fe for a special session if they did approve medical malpractice legislation.
The governor, who is in her final regular session after taking office as governor in 2019, also hailed the Legislature's approval of a bill making it easier to pursue court-ordered treatment for individuals deemed to pose a threat to themselves or others.
Similar attempts to pass such involuntary civil commitment legislation had stalled in previous sessions at the Roundhouse.
"I'm deeply grateful to the members of the Legislature who worked so hard to get these measures across the finish line," Lujan Grisham said. "These weren't easy lifts. They required months of negotiation, good faith and a willingness to put New Mexicans first."
Some bills remain in limbo
While some high-profile measures won legislative approval, others fell by the wayside at the Roundhouse in the session's final hours.
Sen. Crystal Brantley, R-Elephant Butte, said a bipartisan bill to change the state's criminal code for juvenile offenders, Senate Bill 165, would not be voted on by the full Senate before the session's end.
That would mark the second consecutive year that no legislation dealing with juvenile crime had won approval from lawmakers, despite support from the governor and top state law enforcement officials.
Meanwhile, eight interstate compact bills dealing with counselors, physical therapists and other professions remain stalled in the Senate late Wednesday after having passed the House. Two additional interstate compact bills — dealing with doctors and social workers — were among a batch of fast-tracked bills signed by the governor on Feb. 5, but the remaining compact bills have struggled to advance.
One proposal that appeared to have better odds of passing was a relief package targeted at three New Mexico counties — and the communities within them that house federal immigration detention centers — that passed the Senate on Wednesday and was awaiting action in the House.
The bill, Senate Bill 173, was crafted in reaction to the Immigrant Safety Act, which was signed by the governor this month and may close the immigrant detention sites in rural New Mexico. It would provide $10.5 million in stopgap funding to counties and municipalities that rely economically on detention centers.
"I'm afraid of my district turning into a ghost town," said Rep. Stefani Lord, R-Sandia Park, whose district includes the Torrance County Detention Facility in Estancia, one of three facilities.
Tax breaks and pay hikes
The biggest surprise on the session's penultimate day came during the House tax committee's meeting on an omnibus tax package approved by the Senate just three days earlier.
Instead of adding additional tax breaks, House Democrats instead tacked onto the bill the pay raise for state workers and educators that will cost the state an estimated $62.7 million in the coming budget year. The revised tax package then passed the House late Wednesday on a 43-19 vote.
House Speaker Javier Martínez, D-Albuquerque, called the move a "creative" approach to ensuring public employees do not go without a raise for the first time since 2018.
The tax package would raise an estimated $111.5 million in annual revenue for the state by decoupling the state's corporate income tax from several components of a federal budget bill signed by President Donald Trump last summer.
Revenue generated by the corporate tax change would effectively be used to pay for the salary increases and about $51 million in tax credits and deductions. Local governments could also see an impact on their gross receipts tax collections.
Republican lawmakers objected to the corporate tax shift during Wednesday's debate, saying it would undermine attempts to make New Mexico more economically competitive. Other states like Colorado and California have already moved to decouple parts of their tax code from the federal changes, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
"We need to have a focus on whether we're going to put ourselves at a competitive advantage with the states around us," said Rep. Joshua Hernandez, R-Rio Rancho.
The tax breaks in the bill include a $10,000 personal income tax credit for full-time New Mexico physicians, which would begin next year and last through 2031. Also included are two tax breaks for local news organizations — one for newspapers printed in the state and the other for employing local journalists.
Journal staff writer Gillian Barkhurst contributed to this report.
New Mexico medical malpractice reform passes Senate, heads to governor - Patrick Lohmann, Source New Mexico
The New Mexico Senate late Tuesday passed a medical malpractice overhaul bill that has drawn widespread public interest amid a statewide doctor shortage.
The bill now heads to the desk of Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, who has called malpractice reform one of her top priorities in her final legislative session as governor and urged the Legislature to pass the measure.
The Senate voted 40-2 to support House Bill 99, sponsored by Reps. Christine Chandler (D-Los Alamos) and Gail Armstrong (D-Magdalena). The two “no” votes came from Sens. Shannon Pinto (D-Tohatchi) and Linda Lopez (D-Albuquerque).
House lawmakers who drafted the bill urged the Senate to pass HB99 and touted it as a compromise that seeks to improve the state’s climate for doctors while also ensuring patients harmed by malpractice get compensation they deserve.
The final vote came after the chamber, including eight Democrats who voted alongside Republicans, voted to strip amendments that the Senate Judiciary Committee had added earlier Tuesday.
At the committee meeting Tuesday morning, Senate Judiciary Chair Joseph Cervantes (D-Las Cruces) introduced three amendments, which the committee voted to adopt, that he said would shield the law from constitutional and other court challenges.
One amendment changed definitions about what counts as a medical injury subject to litigation; another required that medical costs awarded to an injured patient are based on how much the patient was billed instead of how much the patient actually paid. The third struck language that enabled New Mexico-owned hospitals to have a lower cap on punitive damages.
On the Senate floor, Sen. Crystal Brantley (R-Elephant Butte), who also serves on the Senate Judiciary Committee, introduced the amendment that removed the Senate Judiciary amendments from the bill. She described them as “poison pills” that “disregard the hard work of good faith-efforts that went into this legislation over the past month.”
Cervantes defended the changes as necessary and based on his long history as a trial lawyer. He reiterated his prediction that the unamended bill won’t stand up to legal challenges.
“I have to respectfully ask the body to recognize and respect the work that was done for legal principles based on precedent, based on case law,” he said. “Reject the notion that this is done for money, pecuniary gain, poison pills, all of the rhetoric.”
Lawmakers ultimately voted 25-17 to get rid of the amendments. As a result, the bill does not need to go back to the House of Representatives for a concurrence vote. Chandler told Source before the vote that at least two of the amendments could be tough for fellow House members to accept.
Despite voting in favor of the bill, Sen. Katy Duhigg (D-Albuquerque), who unsuccessfully introduced five amendments to the bill during the Senate Judiciary Committee meeting, predicted that the bill will not reduce medical malpractice premiums for doctors, while meanwhile leaving patients harmed due to malpractice with less recourse.
“Let’s stop telling New Mexicans that this bill will fix what’s broken. It won’t,” she said. “It won’t end a nationwide doctor shortage that’s been in the making for 50 years. It won’t improve patient care, and it won’t end malpractice lawsuits.”
In a statement following the vote, Senate Republicans said the bill’s passage vindicated the party for its medical malpractice reform efforts and thanked the governor and her staff “for joining us in advocating for this important reform. We’ve proven we can work together towards true progress on our state’s most pressing issues!”
Think New Mexico, a nonpartisan advocacy group that pushed for many of the reforms included in HB 99, said a wide coalition of organizations and interests came together to send more than 11,000 emails in support.
“House Bill 99 directly addresses the primary reason why so many doctors are considering leaving New Mexico or retiring early: our unbalanced medical malpractice laws,” the organization said in a statement late Tuesday. “The passage of this legislation gives them a reason to stay.”
If Lujan Grisham signs the bill as expected, HB99 goes into effect May 20.
Involuntary commitment bill heads to New Mexico governor’s desk - Joshua Bowling, Source New Mexico
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s office on Wednesday morning said she planned to sign into law a bill that would make it easier for law authorities across the state to pursue involuntary commitment for people who are deemed a threat to themselves or others.
Senate Bill 3 would make it easier for police and court officials to seek involuntary commitment for people who have recently inflicted or attempted to inflict “serious bodily harm” on others or who are “more likely than not” to kill themselves. Its provisions would also extend to people with officially diagnosed mental illnesses who are unable to make their own decisions about food or shelter.
“For too long, families have watched their loved ones spiral without any good options to intervene,” Lujan Grisham said in a Wednesday statement. “This law changes that. We’re giving communities the tools they need to act — and giving families something they haven’t had enough of — hope.”
Early in the session, behavioral health advocates opposed the bill and said it could erode due process by committing people who do not consent to treatment. On the New Mexico House of Representatives floor Tuesday, Rep. Tara Lujan (D-Santa Fe), one of the bill’s few opponents, expressed concerns about how it could affect people with disabilities.
“What if there was an individual that has a disability that looks like a [mental] disorder, but is not?” Lujan said from the House floor. “I would hope this bill would not even pass at this point. I think there needs to be further protections for our disabilities communities and I think there needs to be more training for our police officers to protect them, because under our civil rights laws for New Mexico, those police officers are now liable if they arrest or detain somebody without cause.”
Nation's only unsalaried legislature in New Mexico asks voters to reconsider volunteer status - By Morgan Lee, Associated Press
Members of the nation's only unsalaried legislature are asking voters to reconsider their volunteer status that has endured for 114 years since statehood in New Mexico.
The state Senate on Tuesday night narrowly endorsed a constitutional amendment that would do away with the state's prohibition on legislative direct compensation. That allows voters to decide in November whether to tie legislative salaries to the median income level in New Mexico — about $67,000 currently.
After stalling for years, the initiative was promoted successfully this time by a group of young female legislators who have talked about the challenges of balancing work, family and legislative duties.
"Can working parents juggle child care, a mortgage and legislative service? Some of us do, but it's not sustainable," said Democratic state Sen. Angel Charley of Acoma, a sponsor of the measure. "When service requires personal wealth or extraordinary sacrifice, representation narrows. ... Democracy shrinks."
New Mexico taxpayers already foot the bill for travel expenses, and an allowance for meals and lodging, when the Legislature is in session. Many lawmakers also have access to public pension benefits.
New Mexico's "citizen legislature" of volunteer politicians has long been a source of civic pride in the state. But advocates for professionalizing the New Mexico Legislature say the current system discourages young, working class candidates from serving and can inhibit progress on complex policy issues as legislators juggle separate paid and political careers.
In New York and California, legislative salaries exceed $100,000, while New Hampshire opts for a nominal $100 annually per lawmaker.