By John V. Wertheim
New Mexico’s Democratic state Senate Pro Tem Tim Jennings gave his most open signal yet on Monday that he will collude with the Republican minority to keep power.
In an interview with the Albuquerque Journal, Jennings said, “When you look at it, I think I’ve got enough votes to be elected the pro-tem by all the members of the state Senate.”
The Senate pro tem’s comments came after a weekend when Senate Democrats met in caucus and voted to oust Jennings from his position. In January there will be 27 Democrats and 15 Republicans in the Senate. If Jennings convinces six other Democrats to join him on his proposed ego trip, he will remain pro tem with the backing of the Republican caucus. Instead of accepting defeat gracefully, Tim Jennings is just too special to play by normal rules. And just maybe, Jennings and his Republican backers have too much riding on the next legislative session.
The GOP and corporate special interests see Jennings as the one chance they have to jerk victory from the jaws of defeat. Jennings voted with Republicans in the Senate 80 percent of the time, according to New Mexico legislative reports. Elevating him to pro tem in January will represent a kind of coup d’etat.
“He has treated the Republican side of the aisle very fairly, and we’re very satisfied with his leadership,” said Republican Senate leader, Stuart Ingle. Indeed. While I’m all for fairness, Ingle should confer with New Mexico voters before deciding how content he should feel about the status quo.
The election showed that voters want change on energy, the environment, classrooms, health care and jobs. And not just Democratic voters, but plenty of independents and moderate Republicans helped win elections for Democrats up and down the ballot and send new progressive leaders to Santa Fe. How else could Tim Eichenberg, John Sapien and Steve Fischmann have defeated the incumbents in three Republican senate districts?
If Jennings is successful in his plan to grab the pro tem position by turning coat, it will be nothing less than overturning the outcome of the November election. Presidency of the Senate is a statewide leadership position. Jennings is showing himself to be a poor specimen of Democrat and is intent on proving that he is a poor ‘small d’ democrat too.
Why is Jennings doing this? No doubt, ego plays a big role. It’s tough to lose. The healthy response is to man-up and take it with a measure of humility.
Siding with Republicans
There also may be a more nefarious factor than egomania at work here. Look at Jennings’ record:
• He sided with Republicans in opposing Democrats’ health care bill to cover 50,000 uninsured New Mexico children by saying they already are covered. “They only need to be signed up,” according to Jennings. He dismissed his party’s bill as “silly,” although voters soundly rejected a similar argument about children’s health care when it came from Steve Pearce in the U.S. Senate race.
• During the legislative session that ended in February, Jennings led the Senate in defeating Richardson’s plan to cover 400,000 uninsured state residents with health care. New Mexico has one of the highest levels of uninsured in the country.
• Last month Jennings sent letters to all public school superintendents telling them to plan for classroom funding cuts and teacher layoffs in January when the Legislature convenes.
• On the other hand, Jennings is the author of a notorious 1997 law that gives farmers and ranchers the right to kill wildlife that present a supposed “immediate threat” to livestock or crops. The law encouraged one rancher in northwestern New Mexico to slaughter 39 pronghorn antelope by shooting them with a shotgun because they were grazing in his dormant alfalfa field. The wildlife were maimed and left to suffer before they died — sadly, a common occurrence across our state thanks to “Jennings Law.”
• Jennings doesn’t stand with New Mexico voters on clean energy and the environment, either. He opposed an effort to strengthen the Efficient Use of Energy Act in 2008, requiring utilities to invest in better energy conservation methods (HB 305). Jennings was one of only two senators to vote no on a tax credit last year to promote greater use of carbon-clean power and solar generating facilities (SB 994).
• And when it comes to the need for tougher ethics rules in the legislature, Jennings just doesn’t get it. After the spectacle of former Pro Tem Manny Aragon going to jail for corruption, current Pro Tem Jennings dismissed any calls for ethics legislation:
“How do you write legislation about being honest?” offered Jennings. “The things that Manny did were clearly illegal. It was clearly against the law. It doesn’t have anything to do with ethics.”
• When it comes to working families’ wages, Jennings sides with corporate interests. He strongly opposed Democrats’ efforts to raise the minimum wage.
Jennings’ public arguments for retaining the position of pro tem don’t add up. They look like a smokescreen to hide the true motives.
Negativity
After Sunday’s ouster, Jennings cited his alleged ability to end negative campaign tactics in New Mexico as a reason to be kept on as pro tem. “I think I’m the best one suited for stopping the negative stuff that’s going on,” he said.
Talk about hypocrisy.
Tim Jennings is hardly the politician to end negativity in our state’s politics. As the Senate’s leader he has poured vitriol into the chamber’s debates over the years, principally singling out Gov. Bill Richardson for negative attacks:
“I really have no earthly idea why we are in this building except to serve the political purposes of this governor,” Jennings said during a 2008 hearing on Richardson’s proposal to provide health care to every child in the state.
“This whole process is just plain screwed up,” Jennings said on the Senate floor in August. “I just wonder why we are here. I have no earthly idea. Other than for political purposes of this governor. Damnit it is true. We all know it. But we’re too afraid to say it.”
“I am going to tell you that if this body, and this Legislature, does not stand up on their feet and defend this institution, this governor will take us all straight to hell,” according to Jennings last year.
When other senators lashed out with personal attacks on Richardson, Pro Tem Jennings listened approvingly and never once brought them to order.
Sen. John Grubesic, D-Santa Fe, for instance, urged fellow senators on the floor last summer to “don’t trust the governor on this thing. There is nothing bold about this legislation. It’s a rip off. This is a scam.” But boss of the Senate, Jennings, was silent. Even when Grubesic finished by saying that accepting on faith the governor’s argument for his health care expansion bill “is like accepting a dinner invitation from Hannibal Lecter,” Jennings could not be stirred.
Tim Jennings rushed to the public defense of Republican Senate Minority Whip Leonard Rawson in the final days of the recent election, however, decrying supposedly “negative” attacks on “a good man.” But Jennings was silent while Republicans savaged Democrats, which I’ve written about in a previous column.
Contrast this record with that of Sen. Carlos Cisneros, who the Democratic caucus selected on Sunday for pro tem. Cisneros is a solid Democrat with strong progressive values through more than 20 years serving in the Legislature. The decision of the caucus, reinvigorated with incoming progressives and representing the views of a majority of New Mexico voters, should be respected. Democrats across our state should demand that Cisneros be installed as pro tem in January.
After all, allowing Tim Jennings to remain as head of the New Mexico Senate would be like leaving Bush and Cheney in the White House for another four years. The voters have spoken in our democracy, and they don’t want it. Are Senate Democrats listening?
Wertheim is the former chairman of the Democratic Party of New Mexico.