The attorney general’s office is standing by its assertion that a nonprofit’s activities have crossed the line between policy lobbying and political campaigning and its prior advice that the secretary of state force the group to comply with campaign finance reporting laws.
That statement from Attorney General Gary King was issued this afternoon in a strongly worded news release. The release appeared to be a direct response to an article in the New Mexico Independent in which the deputy secretary of state was quoted as saying the AG’s office had told him to disregard that advice.
“If the deputy secretary of state thought we had instructed him to simply ignore our letter, then that was a misunderstanding on his part of what was said,” King said in the release.
The Independent article was headlined “Ignore that letter” and quoted Deputy Secretary of State Don Francisco Trujillo as saying that, after Chief Deputy Attorney General Al Lama sent the May 22 letter telling the secretary of state to change the status of New Mexico Youth Organized (NMYO), Lama called and told him “to disregard (the letter) or set it aside. I don’t remember the exact terminology. The message was, ‘We’ve decided that is not our final say.’”
The release from King’s office said he stands by Lama’s letter.
“Despite some reports to the contrary, we fully support our earlier position in a letter that the secretary of state’s office needs to tell (NMYO) to immediately comply with the law,” King said. “Due to the spread of misinformation there seems to be some thought that my office had ‘disavowed’ our letter or told the secretary of state to ‘ignore’ our advice. That is just not true.”
AG says mailers were campaign materials
The controversy surrounds mailers NMYO, its parent nonprofit the Center for Civic Policy and other progressive groups sent two to three months before the June primary targeting several lawmakers. Though Lama’s letter doesn’t mention the mailers, today’s news release state’s that the AG’s opinion is based at least in part on the belief that the mailers were campaign materials, not lobbying materials.
Officials with NMYO and the Center for Civic Policy argue that the mailers were policy-based and aimed to influence lawmakers in advance of the approaching special session and had nothing to do with the election. They point to the fact that the mailers stopped two months before the election and say some lawmakers who weren’t in hotly contested races were targeted along with those who lost at the hands of progressives.
King isn’t buying it.
“The group claims that the mailers it sent out were not campaign materials,” his news release states. “The attorney general disagrees.”
“There’s an old saying that if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it’s probably a duck,” King said in the release. “And I think we know a duck when we see one.”
The policy director for the Center for Civic Policy, Matt Brix, said in an interview that the group is “disappointed in the directive that Attorney General King’s office has released, and we strongly disagree with their conclusions reached.”
‘We’re doing the due diligence on this’
Despite the AG’s advice, the secretary of state’s office hasn’t changed the status of NMYO. Officials have said the situation is still under review. Phil Sisneros, spokesman for King’s office, was quoted in the Independent article as saying that, in considering what to do about NMYO, all options remain open.
Lest anyone think that means King’s office might back away from Lama’s letter, Sisneros said in an interview that isn’t going to happen.
“We’re pretty firm in the position,” he said.
That doesn’t necessarily mean the secretary of state will follow the AG’s advice. Lama’s original letter states that it was preceded by an April 25 letter in which the secretary of state decided that NMYO was a lobbying organization not subject to the Campaign Practices Act.
Sisneros said the only reason the secretary of state hasn’t acted is because the AG asked that office to hold off while it considered the arguments of the Center for Civic Policy. The group sent a letter to the secretary of state outlining its position that has been forwarded to the AG.
“We wanted to see what the Center for Civic Policy was saying too, why they were saying our advice was incorrect or flawed,” Sisneros said. “We’re doing the due diligence on this.”
He said there’s no timeline for the completion of the AG’s review of the Center for Civic Policy’s arguments.
By way of disclosure, I also write for the New Mexico Independent, which is owned by the Center for Independent Media in