From the ashes will rise a new vision for humanity.

Today we want to share our gratitude with all of you for the outpouring of support and solidarity from our community as we face the new year and the challenges that lie ahead. Each gift we have received, no matter how large or small, not only supports our daily work, but also the experts and legal partners we enlist to help us win for New Mexicans and Mother Earth. We feel you with us and we cannot thank you enough.

On November 9th, 2016 - what feels like a lifetime past - Valerie Kaur spoke this prayer:

In our tears and agony, we hold our children close and confront the truth: The future is dark. But my faith dares me to ask:What if this darkness is not the darkness of the tomb, but the darkness of the womb? What if our America is not dead but a country still waiting to be born? What if the story of America is one long labor? What if all the mothers who came before us, who survived genocide and occupation, slavery and Jim Crow, racism and xenophobia and Islamophobia, political oppression and sexual assault, are standing behind us now, whispering in our ear: You are brave? What if this is our Great Contraction before we birth a new future? Remember the wisdom of the midwife: “Breathe,” she says. Then: “Push.”

What will rise from the ashes of our less than perfect Democracy? What will we birth when humanity rejects genocide and ecocide, when the oligarchs and authoritarians racing to consolidate power through control of communication, information and military might, fall in the face of the one single constant: We are all connected and dependent on each other and our Mother Earth.

This is a dark time, but we can see a light growing stronger in the distance. From the exponential growth of solar energy and electric vehicles across the planet, to the widespread grassroots opposition to ICE brutality, to the movements for public power in New Mexico and New York, to the election of Zohran Mamdani in New York and Katie Wilson in Seattle, to the development of a cadre of anti-corporatist Senators calling themselves the Fight Club, to the candidacy of unapologetic progressives like Julie Gonzales in Colorado and Peggy Flanagan in Minnesota. 

The people are demanding change, and progressive policies are growing in popularity. A solid majority supports a higher minimum wage, stronger unions, higher taxes on the rich, greater public investment in infrastructure, and an expanded social safety net. A whopping 79% now believe immigration makes our country stronger.

Yes, we must march, we must protest, we must rebel against injustice, because collective action builds the solidarity necessary to give birth to a creative vision of an alternative future. (How effective is protesting? According to historians and political scientists: Very) But we must also make visible that alternative based in reciprocity and care - community gardens, universal basic income, free child care and transit, cooperative business models and public ownership of essential services like healthcare and energy. 

New Mexico can set an example. Senator Harold Pope Jr. recently penned an op-ed titled Utilities belong to the people - not Wall Street, the Attorney General warned against the risks inherent in BCP's ownership structure, and a group of 19 legislators wrote to the PRC to warn against a private equity takeover of our utilities. The coordinated opposition of hundreds of water protectors successfully defeated the scheme to push through dumping of oil and gas waste on our land, and environmental advocates from across the state have risen up to oppose the obscene pollution permits demanded by Project Jupiter. Our Governor and legislature could take bold strides to achieve a just transition to a clean energy economy, if only they could throw off the yolk of oil and gas industry influence. It is our job to demand that they join the people or get out of the way. 

History itself is a long litany of collective action to overthrow greed and tyranny and try again for a more just and equitable future. We can take care of vulnerable people, take care of our children, and take care of our Mother. We do not need to cater to the profit of a few when we know we can demand and win on wellbeing for all.

As we enter this new year we take this moment to breathe together - to give thanks for all the people who stand in solidarity with us, and to close our eyes and imagine the future that we want for our children.

We know you will join with us when the time comes to strike again at the legal and financial enablers of fossil fuels, and to demand investments in the new and just economy that is waiting to be born.