AG sends letter to secretary of state, won’t release it

The attorney general’s office sent a letter today outlining its opinion on whether the secretary of state should force a nonprofit to comply with the state’s campaign finance reporting law, but it won’t release the letter publicly because, according to the AG’s spokesman, it isn’t a public record.

“I can confirm that we did send a letter to the secretary of state’s office today,” AG spokesman Phil Sisneros said. “What we sent to them is our legal advice.”

Sisneros said the letter is exempt from the state’s public records act because of attorney/client privilege.

The letter is the latest in an ongoing controversy about the status of New Mexico Youth Organized (NMYO). In response to mailers the group sent two to three months before the June primary targeting several lawmakers, including three who lost, the AG sent a May 22 letter to the secretary of state advising it to change the status of NMYO, arguing that the mailers crossed the line between policy lobbying and political campaigning.

Then New Mexico Youth Organized and the Center for Civic Policy, its parent organization, sent a letter to the secretary of state disputing the AG’s advice. Consideration of the groups’ arguments led to the new letter the AG sent to the secretary of state today. The groups have threatened to sue if the secretary of state changes their status and say the mailers were aimed at influencing the coming special session, not the election.

The AG’s office made the May 22 letter public by releasing it to media organizations. Asked today why it is a public record and the new letter is not, Sisneros said the May 22 letter was “not technically” formal legal advice, but was instead “an open communication.”

James Flores, spokesman for the secretary of state, has not returned a call seeking comment. The secretary of state has not yet acted on the status of NMYO.

Though Sisneros wouldn’t release information about the contents of today’s letter, he has previously said the attorney general’s office is “pretty firm” in its position that the mailers crossed the line into political campaigning.

Update, 8:15 p.m.

Flores told the New Mexico Independent that his office received the letter, is meeting with the AG’s office on Friday and hopes to resolve the issue then.

By way of disclosure, I also write for the New Mexico Independent, which is owned by the Center for Independent Media in Washington. When the group was starting up its New Mexico news site earlier this year, the Center for Civic Policy helped it locate funding sources. The Center for Civic Policy has never tried to use that fact to influence anything I have written.