Diane Denish
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Diane Denish says one of the Republican candidates, Janice Arnold-Jones, has “shown a real commitment to increased transparency” but voters may be wondering about the other three GOP hopefuls.
“At least one of the four announced Republican candidates have shown a real commitment to increased transparency,” Denish spokesman Chris Cervini said about Arnold-Jones. “At some point, the voters of New Mexico are going to start to wonder about whether the other candidates might have something to hide.”
Denish was responding to the news that Arnold Jones has posted on her Web site information about every campaign contribution she’s received to date – 168 contributions totaling a little more than $53,000 – and that she plans to keep the list of contributions current, adding new contributions to the Web site each time one is received.
Denish has been touting her own campaign as the most transparent among the gubernatorial candidates because she’s been voluntarily been releasing campaign finance reports – lists of contributions and expenditures – quarterly, though in off-election years it’s only required twice. She plans to voluntarily release another report in the next couple of weeks for the fourth quarter of 2009.
Earlier this week, Denish accused the GOP candidates of operating “in the dark” for not agreeing to do the same. That came before Arnold-Jones unveiled her online list of contributions.
The other Republican gubernatorial candidates — Albuquerque business owners Allen Weh and Doug Turner and Doña Ana County District Attorney Susana Martinez – have not responded to my question about whether they would match Denish in releasing a fundraising report this month.