2025 Legislative Reflections

SOME MAJOR VICTORIES AND SOME SOBERING REALITIES - CHANGE IS ON THE HORIZON

We hope this email finds you well and resting after the whirlwind that has been the 2025 Legislative Session. We are all on break this week - taking time to catch our breath, spend time with loved ones, and anchor back into the lands we love that give our hearts fuel for this fight. It's spring! And though there is ever increasing heaviness and destruction - Mama nature continues her cycling. We are finding renewed hope in the flowering trees, the returning insects and birds, and being outside with family and friends. We wanted to share our wrap of the session so we can be ready to move to bigger and better things and engage your ongoing participation in pushing the few very important wins we were able to secure, across the finish line with the Governor's signature.It has been an exhausting two months!

We have watched, as expected, the influence of oil and gas money at the Roundhouse kill any and all bills that would increase regulation to protect public health and the environment from oil and gas pollution. At the same time there were more bold climate and public health protection bills introduced than we can recall in previous years. Courageous legislators introduced bills to require emissions reductions (SB 4), to establish buffer zones around schools (HB 35), to prohibit PFAS and require chemical disclosure in oil and gas drilling (HB 222), and to address the air pollution, methane leaks and the scourge of unplugged and abandoned wells strewn across the state (HB 257, 258, 481, 581, and SB 178). All of these were either voted down or denied hearings by Democratic committee chairs.

Representatives Debbie Sariñana, Andrea Romero, Matthew McQueen and Senators Mimi Stewart, Harold Pope Jr., Patricia Roybal-Caballero and Jeff Steinborn attempted to take bold action to curb oil and gas pollution. Many others co-sponsored and voted with them on these bills, and took courageous votes against the dangerous and false climate solutions that are relentlessly and continuously pushed by industry advocates at the Roundhouse.

We were heartened to observe the growing awareness and efforts by legislators to take action on climate, and we can celebrate the passage of some very important legislation. The Community Benefits Fund (SB 48) and the Innovation in State Government Fund (SB 83) will begin the investments necessary for the Just Transition work that YUCCA and other frontline organizations have been advocating for many years. NMED took the lead to prohibit PFAS in consumer goods and regulate PFAS in waste streams (HB 212 and HB 140), and to establish a pollution discharge permitting framework to protect New Mexico waterways (SB 21). SB 5, Game Commission Reform, will better protect New Mexico Wildlife, and HB 128, the Local Solar Access Fund will invest $20 million in solar and storage projects for our communities, a tremendous win after two years of advocacy!

We are also very inspired and heartened that a strong list of civil rights bills protecting our communities passed through both chambers thanks to the tireless advocacy of the immigrant rights community.

These climate and social justice bills now await the Governor's signature.

WHAT DID WE LEARN??

Your early engagement and activism does make a difference! The push for investment of hundreds of millions dollars for expensive and dangerous false climate solutions like carbon capture and storage, hydrogen and produced water reuse is relentless, but together with you, the public, and with the courageous voices of environmental advocates, and grassroots and Indigenous groups from across the state who showed up at hearings and made thousands of calls and emails, we prevented the worst of it.

Produced water reuse was shut down in the Strategic Water Supply Act and the Reclaimed Water Act. And carbon capture permitting (HB 457) was killed on Tuesday in Senate Conservation. These were hard fought wins!

However, despite our joint herculean efforts, the "advanced technology" cabal at the Roundhouse has used their considerable power and influence to direct hundreds of millions of public dollars towards "economic development" projects, which take the form of public private partnerships and grants to private industries without adequate oversight or the inclusion of any criteria related to public health, the environment or climate emissions.

SB 170 will allow utilities to build first, especially for commercial development projects, and then seek ratepayer reimbursement later, transferring unnecessary cost and risk to utility customers for the benefit of private companies. HB 458, the Carbon Dioxide Storage Stewardship Act grant the state the authority to pursue dangerous and unproven CCS technology, HB 19, the Trade Ports Development Act was resurrected after a committee defeat and will allow for and fund public entities entering into public-private partnership agreements to help finance and work on "trade port projects" with no criteria to protect public health and the environment. And HB 20, the Technology and Innovation Division Act, was raised from the dead to provide $100M annually for "advanced technology" grants in a shocking illustration of the power these industries wield at the Roundhouse. 

INDUSTRY LARGELY RUNNING THE SHOW AT THE NM LEGISLATURE

After a robust debate HB 20, the Technology and Innovation Division Act was killed in Senate Tax last Saturday because of its lack of criteria to protect public health and the environment, but the sponsor, Rep. Dixon, used her influence to bring the bill back for another vote in the same committee on a Motion for Reconsideration from Republican Senator Ramos. We raced to show up for the hastily scheduled rehearing on Tuesday, but only one comment was allowed to be heard for and against, and then, while two of the Senators who had originally rejected the bill were excused, HB 20 was swiftly passed on a 7-1 vote.

Senator O'Malley, one of the original No votes, raised her concerns about the lack of definitions to protect the environment. Then the Chair asked the sponsor a disingenuous question about whether there "was anything about" produced water or hydrogen in the bill, and she responded artfully that neither word appears. (Yes exactly. Our point about the vague language in the bill was confirmed!) The vote was then immediately taken without any further debate.

Watch the entirety of this movida in the seven minute video below:

The Senators didn't bother to dig deeper and ask a more meaningful question, like "Can the grants authorized in this bill be used to fund hydrogen or produced water treatment projects?" Unfortunately we suspect that they did not want to know the answer.

This is the shocking and sub-standard level of legislative review taking place at our legislature when big business comes asking for a handout. The committee voted for a $100 million annual slush fund for grants to private industry that includes zero criteria for protection of public health, the environment or climate emissions in target sectors with absolutely no definition.

Similarly, HB 169, the Public Expression Protection Act, was a priority of the ACLU, journalists and environmental advocates across the state who are watching our democratic rights to free speech and protest dangerously attacked across the country. With your help - hundreds of calls and emails delivered - the bill showed up on the agenda for Senate Judiciary late on Tuesday night, but then a new agenda was posted at 1:24PM the next day, and it was gone. This on the same day that a SLAAP suit filed by Energy Transfer Partners succeeded in finding Greenpeace liable for hundreds of millions in damages as retaliation for its Dakota Access Pipeline opposition! Up until late Thursday night we were told it might be scheduled, but that never happened.

The failure of our legislature to pass HB 169 means that every member of the public, every journalist, every advocate in the state must fear litigation every time they level a criticism against a powerful person or corporation. Our legislature has failed to protect us.

CHANGE IS COMING

Our climate, our democracy and our healthcare systems are in crisis. Crisis is the catalyst for change. We are seeing the seeds of that change in the growing number of legislators who are increasingly trying to stand up to the oil and gas industry in New Mexico. We are seeing the seeds of that change in the thousands of calls and emails you sent, and the improbably victories we achieved. We are seeing the seeds of that change in the hundreds gathering at the Roundhouse to stand up for the rule of law and for justice - justice for immigrants, justice for truth speakers, and justice for our Mother Earth.

“When faced with a radical crisis, when the old way of being in the world, of interacting with each other and with the realm of nature doesn’t work anymore, when survival is threatened by seemingly insurmountable problems, an individual life-form — or a species — will either die or become extinct or rise above the limitations of its condition through an evolutionary leap.” Eckhart Tolle