Now that Ken Martinez of Grants is vying for speaker of the House, Joseph Cervantes of Las Cruces and Mimi Stewart of Albuquerque are battling to be the next House majority leader.
Cervantes announced his intention to Doña Ana County’s other six House Democrats during a meeting over the weekend called by Rep. Mary Helen Garcia of Las Cruces.
Reps. Garcia and Andy Nuñez and Representative-elect Nate Cote all confirmed that Cervantes said he will seek the majority leader position if Martinez does not. I’ve been unable to reach Cervantes for comment.
Garcia and two other sources confirmed that Stewart will also seek the No. 2 position in the House. I’ve been unable to reach Stewart for comment.
Garcia said the chances of Martinez ousting Ben Lujan as speaker and of Cervantes becoming majority leader are good. She is working hard to make that happen.
“I think we’ve got strong support for Ken and Joseph,” she said. “We’ve been trying to count up our votes, and all I can say is that it’s promising.”
She said the weekend meeting of area Democrats had several purposes – to discuss the strength of the county’s seven House Democrats as a group, to talk about issues and projects they might support, to educate the new members, and to discuss the leadership battles.
As to the leadership positions, there was no consensus, Garcia said.
“Some members were not ready to commit, and they’re entitled to that,” she said.
Cote said he is leaning toward supporting Lujan for speaker, and said he doesn’t know who he will support for majority leader.
“I’m leaning my support toward the speaker right now, although I still have a couple of weeks to go,” he said. “He has experience. … I’m leaning that way, but I definitely have to feel comfortable as far as ethics.”
Lujan has been criticized for ruling with an iron fist, making deals behind closed doors and repeatedly disregarding House rules. He has also come under fire since last week’s report in the Albuquerque Journal that one of his top aides has been living rent-free in a home owned by the Region III Housing Authority.
Another factor in who will lead the House has to be that the campaigns of new representatives Cote and Jeff Steinborn and others who were up for re-election this year were heavily financed by Lujan and the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee. That group is led by Stewart, a close ally of Lujan.
I was unable to reach Steinborn for comment.
Nuñez said he has pledged support for Lujan. Garcia said Nuñez announced at the weekend meeting that he will support Lujan because the speaker pledged to make him chair of the Agriculture and Water Resources Committee.
Nuñez would not confirm that.
Cote said his perception of the weekend meeting was that its primary intent “was to organize our seven Democrats into a cohesive group for support when we go to Santa Fe.”
“Joseph did announce of course that he’d be seeking majority leader,” Cote said. “There were different thoughts, and I don’t recall any particular commitment one way or the other.”
Nuñez also said that is what happened, but said he and Rep. Antonio Lujan of Las Cruces left the meeting early.
“Antonio Lujan was a little concerned that we had too many lawyers seeking leadership positions,” Nuñez said, referring to Martinez and Cervantes, who are both attorneys.
In the several years I’ve covered politics, Antonio Lujan has never returned my phone calls. That includes two calls I placed this week.
Rep. Joni Gutierrez of Las Cruces, who said last week she supports Ben Lujan, would not comment further, other than to say that what’s taking place is healthy.
“I don’t think it’s negative. It’s the cycle of the political process,” she said. “It’s happened in the past, where you have these situations, and you’ll have them in the future.”