Private equity firm returns $13.3M to PNM’s parent company following criticism - Joshua Bowling, Source New Mexico
The private equity firm seeking to acquire New Mexico’s largest electric provider has returned more than $13 million in dividends it earned from a stock sale that state utility regulators in July determined to be illegal, recent filings show.
The New Mexico Public Regulation Commission in July voted 2-1 to rule that a $400 million stock transaction between a Blackstone Infrastructure affiliate and TXNM Energy Inc., which owns PNM, violated state law, in part because the companies did not first obtain PRC approval.
The commission ordered the companies to undo the sale, rendering it “void and of no effect.”
Critics of the proposed $11.5 billion merger between Blackstone and TXNM were quick to point out that, in subsequent regulatory filings, Blackstone’s attorneys revealed that the private equity firm held onto about $13.3 million in dividends created by the stock sale after undoing the stock sale.
“They complied with the ‘void’ part, but not the ‘of no effect’ part,” Mariel Nanasi, executive director of the Santa Fe-based clean energy advocacy organization New Energy Economy, told Source NM. “If it never happened, then you can’t be making profit off of it.”
Opponents to the overall merger took aim at the $13.3 million in dividends at a recent public comment hearing that the PRC held on the University of New Mexico campus in Albuquerque late last month.
In a regulatory filing this week, attorneys for Blackstone wrote that the firm repaid the $13.3 million to TXNM on Aug. 7, “after consultation” with PRC regulatory staffers.
Blackstone did not respond to Source NM’s request for comment.
Last month, Blackstone and TXNM agreed to extend the deadline for the pending acquisition, which still needs state approval, to mid-2027. Company leaders have long said that a cash infusion from a firm like Blackstone would be the best way to invest in New Mexico’s aging power grid.
“We appreciate the NMPRC’s careful review of this case and look forward to further demonstrating why this partnership will strengthen the grid, support long-term investment and deliver meaningful benefits for customers and communities across New Mexico and Texas,” TXNM Energy President and CEO Don Tarry wrote in a statement at the time.
The state wanted him charged in a fatal wolf trapping. Instead, prosecutors had him download an app. - Matthew Reisen, Albuquerque Journal
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham in August asked Attorney General Raúl Torrez to consider prosecuting a Catron County trapper who killed a Mexican gray wolf after trapping it on public land. Instead, Torrez’s office required him to get an app.
William Nelson, permitted to set traps as a public safety and depredation control officer with the Catron County Sheriff’s Office, was ordered by the New Mexico Department of Justice to download the onX Hunt app. The app shows private and public land boundaries, according to a pre-prosecution letter obtained by the Journal.
According to a Catron County Sheriff’s Office report, the wolf was caught in July 2025 in a trap set by Nelson on public land, 300 yards from legal traps he set on private property. Nelson told authorities he put a sleeping bag over the wolf’s head as he and a rancher tried to free it, and it died.
A necropsy found the wolf died of suffocation, complicated by its airway being blocked by food it regurgitated while being restrained. Photos with the incident report show the wolf alive, caught in the trap, and its body after being killed, along with the military-issue sleeping bag. Nelson said he tried to “revive the wolf," and the necropsy found blunt force trauma to the organs possibly caused by CPR attempts. It listed the proximate cause of death as entrapment and the immediate cause as asphyxiation.
Nelson, who has been previously permitted to trap and kill wolves, was also investigated in a 2013 wolf killing. In that case, Nelson shot a yearling female wolf he said he believed at 250 yards was a coyote. He told authorities the wolf had killed a calf nearby.
Setting traps on public lands has been a misdemeanor crime since the state Legislature passed Roxy’s Law in 2022, named after an 8-year-old heeler mix fatally injured by a trap set on public land. Since the law passed, 23 wolves have been caught in private traps around the state, not including wolves trapped as part of the management program.
Nelson could not be reached Thursday. Torrez’s office did not respond to multiple emails seeking comment. The Catron County Sheriff’s Office also did not respond to emailed questions and a call seeking comment.
Emails and records obtained by the advocacy group Western Watersheds Project showed the Department of Wildlife sought to file charges against Nelson in the 7th Judicial District, which declined to prosecute, saying “it would be impossible to convict at a jury trial an accidental killing of a wolf in Catron County.”
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also declined to file federal charges in the killing. The Department of Wildlife sought a venue change and NMDOJ prosecution as “a fair trial will not be obtainable in Catron County.”
In an Aug. 14 letter to Torrez, Lujan Grisham stated Nelson, a depredation contractor working for CCSO, had set the traps for coyotes in response to recent cattle kills. The letter states that after trapping the wolf, Nelson “did not await professional assistance” to release the animal, smothering it with a sleeping bag in the process.
Nelson set the trap illegally on public lands, “which ultimately caused the lethal take of a federally and state listed endangered species,” according to the letter.
“I request that you assess these facts and decide whether prosecution is warranted in this case,” the letter states.
As part of the pre-prosecution agreement offered by NMDOJ, Nelson agreed to download the app and shared a photo of the app on his phone with Torrez’s office.
NMDOJ said in the agreement it would not bring charges against Nelson and close the criminal investigation with prejudice. The agreement read, “if the terms and conditions as outlined are later violated, the NMDOJ will seek to file charges in respect to this incident.”
Lujan Grisham’s office declined to comment. A spokesperson said the letter from the governor “speaks for itself.”
Greta Anderson, deputy director with Western Watersheds Project, said the wolf killed was AM2765, an alpha male of the Frieborn pack. He and his mate had puppies in 2025, she said, and were likely teaching them “to hunt and exist in the wild.”
“We just don't know what the effects of that were, but you can be certain that in a species that has such tight family dynamics, losing the father was probably a big deal.”
Anderson said the illegal trapping case against Nelson was “clear cut” as the wolf was collared and the trap location was known. She said the outcome was an “appallingly small penalty for somebody who should have, could have, done better.”
“To have to download an app to your phone is not a sufficient penalty, in my opinion,” Anderson said.
She said in recent years there had been “a lack of enthusiasm” from the federal government in prosecuting cases of wolves being illegally trapped or killed.
“But this creeps over to the state of New Mexico,” Anderson said, adding that she believes the Department of Wildlife and Lujan Grisham tried to get something done. “When agencies are recommending prosecution and the AG doesn't follow through, that's shocking.”
She said there is a “callous disregard” for wolves in places like Catron County — where the wolf management area covers one of the most heavily ranched portions of the state.
“Most people will be horrified to think of an endangered species, choking on its own vomit under a heavy sleeping bag. That is a fate that's unacceptable for animals, and there's more humane ways to manage wildlife than that,” Anderson said.
Frijoles Fire holds steady for first time in 5 days - John Miller, Albuquerque Journal
A lightning-caused wildfire that swelled from an estimated 10 acres on Aug. 4 to nearly 8,000 acres this week in the Pecos Wilderness of the Santa Fe National Forest stopped growing for the first time in at least five days on Wednesday.
In a Thursday morning video update posted to social media, Forest Service Operations Manager Jason Flores reported that crews took advantage of more moderate fire behavior Wednesday to inch toward 1% containment of the blaze.
Containment refers to the percentage by which a fire’s outer perimeter has been surrounded by a physical barrier, such as trenches dug by firefighters, roads, cleared brush or natural features such as rivers and rock formations, according to Forest Service spokesman Sean McNearney.
Firefighters on Thursday continued reinforcing the western and northwestern edges of the Frijoles Fire, which has grown since the weekend toward the small communities of Cundiyó, Cerro Piñon, Chimayó and Cordova, as well as the 2,650-acre Gorham Boy Scout Ranch.
“Resources are going to continue to do indirect confinement strategy, prepping around the Gorham Boy Scout Ranch in and around the southern end and continuing on up and around the community of Cundiyo and prepping around there,” Flores said. “Utilization of dozers and mastication work over in that vicinity.”
Firefighters are using Forest Road 306 to the north, Forest Road 424 to the west as existing barriers to advance containment of the Frijoles Fire, which remains the largest fire burning in the state.
After a wildfire has been contained, it may consume natural fuels and go out on its own, but when fires threaten homes and other structures, crews will take more aggressive measures to extinguish the most hazardous fronts directly.
“We are looking at some direct extinguishment strategies over here on this portion of the incident here when the opportunity arises to do so,” Flores said, pointing toward the western and northwestern portions of a map of the fire.
McNearney told the Journal earlier this week that the fire’s rapid growth compared to over a dozen other lightning-caused fires in New Mexico state forests late this summer can be partly attributed to the fire’s remote origins high in the Pecos Wilderness east of Nambé.
While most wildfires are caused by humans in areas the Forest Service and state forestry agencies have increasingly targeted with strategic forest thinning projects, lightning strikes can occur in hard-to-reach areas still choked with dead and downed debris.
Before reported acreage held steady on Wednesday, the Frijoles Fire had nearly quadrupled in size since Sunday, sending smoke wafting into communities as distant as Santa Fe and Taos.
Firefighters and nearby communities hope forecasts calling for precipitation in coming days will bear out, assisting crews battling the fire in northern New Mexico.
National Code Talker Day to bring 101-year-old veteran to Phoenix - By Wufei Yu, Associated Press
Hundreds of Navajos were recruited by the Marine Corps during World War II to create a code based on their native language. Their efforts frustrated the Japanese force and ended up playing a vital role in U.S. victories in the Pacific War.
The program remained secret for decades and in 1982, President Ronald Reagan signed a proclamation designating Aug. 14 as the official day to honor the Navajo Code Talkers and all Native Americans who served in the war.
A crowd is expected to gather in Phoenix to mark the day. Among them will be Thomas H. Begay, 101, who is among the last two remaining Code Talkers.
In all, the military recruited and trained more than 400 Navajo men to communicate confidential information using their then-unwritten language. It became the largest code-talking program in the military at the time.
Between 1942 and 1945, they sent thousands of secret messages on battle tactics and enemy troop movements and ultimately helped save the lives of thousands of Allied soldiers.
"The U.S. was being defeated. Without that code, that war could have been different," said Dawn Manuelito, a granddaughter of one of the first 29 Navajo Code Talkers. "Our language saved this country."
Navajo soldiers were sworn to secrecy
When the Code Talkers were discharged after the war, they couldn't tell anyone — even family members — about their secret mission. The program remained classified until 1968 and then efforts began to formally recognize the soldiers for their contributions.
In 1971, President Richard Nixon sent a letter of appreciation to the Navajo Tribal Council. Code Talker veterans participated in the bicentennial parade in Washington in 1976 and then Begay and other Code Talkers made a written request for recognition that resulted in a 1982 joint congressional resolution and Reagan's proclamation.
In the proclamation, Reagan also acknowledged that members of the Choctaw, Chippewa, Creek, Sioux, and other tribes used their tribal languages as effective battlefield codes in the two world wars.
At least 20 tribes have had members participate in the code talking programs, according to the National Museum of the American Indian.
During World War II, over 40,000 Native American men and women enlisted in the U.S. armed forces. Of the hundreds of Code Talkers deployed, the Comanches participated in operations in Europe, including the D-Day invasion of Nazi-occupied France.
Advocates work to keep the legacy alive
Following President Donald Trump's executive order to end federal diversity and equity programs, the Defense Department deleted thousands of pages honoring contributions by women and minority groups, including the Navajo Code Talkers and other Native American veterans.
Tribes condemned the action. The Pentagon restored some webpages, saying the Navajo Code Talker material was erroneously removed.
Laura Tohe, the Arizona poet laureate and daughter of a Navajo Code Talker, said her father went to a boarding school where students were punished for using their native languages. But when he joined the Army, Tohe said, he and other men were told that the military would use their language to devise a code.
"It's a huge contradiction," Tohe said. "Despite the complicated and dark history and relationship that we have with the U.S., these men were willing to step up because many of them felt like it was their responsibility to serve."
There's no dedicated museum to honor the group. Attempts to build one on the Navajo Nation haven't come to fruition, but plans were announced last week to establish one in Farmington, New Mexico.
Only two Navajo Code Talkers remain
Begay grew up speaking only the Navajo language with his parents. At 13, like many Native American Code Talkers, he first learned English when he was sent to boarding school.
Begay left the Marines in 1946 but joined the U.S. Army a year later. He worked as a communication specialist and was a paratrooper during the Korean War. The experience in Korea convinced him to leave the military in 1953.
The other surviving Navajo Code Talker is Peter MacDonald. He joined the Marine Corps at 15. He was two years too young, so he lied about his age.
After the war, MacDonald worked as an engineer at a defense contractor company and eventually became a powerful and controversial politician on the Navajo Nation. In November 2017, MacDonald, along with other World War II veterans, met Trump in the Oval Office and shared the history of the Navajo Code Talkers.
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Associated Press writer Savannah Peters contributed from Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Public meeting on Frijoles Fire set for Friday evening in Espanola - Mark Haslett, KUNM
The Santa Fe National Forest and local officials have organized a public meeting for the ongoing Frijoles Fire.
The meeting is scheduled for 6 pm Friday in Espanola’s McCracken Gymnasium on the campus of the McCurdy Ministries Community Center, located at 362 South McCurdy Road.
The meeting will also be livestreamed over the Santa Fe National Forest's Facebook page.
The public is invited to submit questions ahead of time to frijoles@firenet.gov by noon on Friday.
Santa Fe City Council approves $2.2 million for drone program after lengthy debate - Nicholas Gilmore, Santa Fe New Mexican
Santa Fe City Council decided to expand the city’s police department drone program after an extensive debate.
The Santa Fe New Mexican reports the council voted 6-2 to approve the $2.2 million program.
Proponents in favor of the item highlighted potential benefits, like uses in missing persons cases and as a tool for police de-escalation.
In regards to privacy, they emphasized the drones were not made by Flock safety and that personal technologies like cellphones are just as invasive.
Those opposed to the program raised concerns of police surveillance and mentioned how earlier this year the Santa Fe Police Department used drones to arrest unhoused people camping on city property.
They also criticized how the money used for these drones could go directly towards other public safety programs.
