{"id":14240,"date":"2010-03-08T17:00:21","date_gmt":"2010-03-09T00:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=14240"},"modified":"2010-03-14T00:07:42","modified_gmt":"2010-03-14T07:07:42","slug":"more-details-emerge-on-salazar%e2%80%99s-resignation-letter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2010\/03\/more-details-emerge-on-salazar%e2%80%99s-resignation-letter\/","title":{"rendered":"More details emerge on Salazar\u2019s resignation letter"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Secretary of State Mary Herrera<\/p><\/div>\n

Another news organization has gotten its hands on a copy of former state Elections Director A.J. Salazar\u2019s resignation letter, but the newspaper didn\u2019t make the full letter public, and the Secretary of State\u2019s Office still hasn\u2019t released it<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Still, in its Friday report on the letter<\/a>, the Rio Grande Sun included details that hadn\u2019t previously been released publicly. The newspaper said it was quoting from an \u201cun-edited and un-redacted\u201d copy, though it didn\u2019t say how it obtained it.<\/p>\n

The letter alleges, according to the Sun, that Secretary of State Mary Herrera<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2022 ordered exempt employees at a meeting held during work hours to obtain 1,000 petition signatures each for her re-election bid \u2018in violation of election laws,\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2022 protected a politically connected IT employee from termination who allegedly hacked into the office\u2019s network,<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2022 failed to properly store voting machines to be used in the upcoming election, and<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2022 pulled back legislation that would have brought transparency to the office\u2019s Confidential Address Program.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The article states that Salazar also \u201cimplicated Deputy Secretary Don Francisco Trujillo<\/a> in some of these activities and accused him of undercutting Salazar\u2019s authority by creating a contradictory chain of command within the Office.\u201d<\/p>\n

E-mails back up one allegation<\/h3>\n

The Sun also obtained e-mails that appear to up Salazar\u2019s claim about Herrera asking an employee to solicit sponsorships from private companies. That action drew an \u201cadmonition\u201d from an assistant AG, the Sun article states. It quotes from the Feb. 10 letter from the assistant AG to Herrera, Trujillo and another secretary of state employee:<\/p>\n

\u201cPlease be aware that solicitations from contractors who have been awarded contracts with the SOS, or who may bid on SOS contract, may create the impression that undue influence or improper associations are tied to such solicitations\/donations. This is especially important for the Secretary of State Office because this office is charged with responsibility for enforcing the Governmental Conduct Act<\/a> in the first instance.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026While solicitations for donations for the conference are not requests for money for the employees, themselves, requests made specifically of contractors who bid or receive SOS contracts can create the appearance of entanglement or influence that the Governmental Conduct Act seeks to avoid.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Here\u2019s Herrera\u2019s response to the assistant AG, according to the Sun:<\/p>\n

\u201cThank you for this information, yes these vendors are being asked to sponsor a break session for the election school. If this is not allowed, I will stop it immediately. They are sponsoring a break for the County Clerks.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Albuquerque Journal was the first to report<\/a> on Salazar\u2019s allegation that Herrera runs \u201ca crooked organization.\u201d Salazar, the Journal reported, has turned over his allegations to the AG for investigation.<\/p>\n

Request requires \u2018additional legal review\u2019<\/h3>\n

Trujillo, who last week refused to release Salazar\u2019s letter in response to a records request, sent this reporter a letter<\/a> today stating that the request requires \u201cadditional legal review.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will reply within fifteen days and notify you when the document is available along with the associated costs,\u201d Trujillo wrote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Rio Grande Sun has obtained a copy of former state Elections Director A.J. Salazar\u2019s resignation letter, but the Sun didn\u2019t make the full letter public, and the Secretary of State\u2019s Office still hasn\u2019t released it. But in its Friday report on the letter, the Sun included details that hadn\u2019t previously been released publicly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,1],"tags":[108,169,111,107],"class_list":["post-14240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","category-uncategorized","tag-2010-election","tag-mary-herrera","tag-open-government","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14240"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14240\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}