{"id":1651,"date":"2007-04-28T18:07:00","date_gmt":"2007-04-29T00:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/04\/vigil-giron-wants-to-be-lieutenant-governor\/"},"modified":"2007-04-28T18:07:00","modified_gmt":"2007-04-29T00:07:00","slug":"vigil-giron-wants-to-be-lieutenant-governor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/04\/vigil-giron-wants-to-be-lieutenant-governor\/","title":{"rendered":"Vigil-Giron wants to be lieutenant governor"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Former Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron<\/a> wants to be lieutenant governor. <\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

You might be thinking that she\u2019s looking to get on a ticket in 2010. Vigil-Giron, however, is thinking about next year.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

She told me that during the Democrats\u2019 convention in Las Cruces<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> today.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

There isn\u2019t currently a way in state law to replace the lieutenant governor if the governor leaves office and the current lieutenant governor moves up. Voters would have to approve a constitutional amendment to set up a system.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

A bill that would have proposed that voters allow the new governor to appoint a replacement with concurrence from the House and Senate died in this year\u2019s legislative session because time expired.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

But there\u2019s still time next year. Vigil-Giron, a big supporter of Gov. Bill Richardson\u2019s<\/a> presidential run, says she\u2019s hoping the Legislature will approve the bill next year and voters will OK the change in November. About that time, she believes, Richardson<\/st1:city> will be on his way to Washington<\/st1:city>, D.C.<\/st1:state><\/st1:place> in some capacity.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

That would allow current Lt. Gov Diane Denish<\/a>, who would become governor, to appoint a new lieutenant governor.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to throw my hat in the ring if that\u2019s the case,\u201d Vigil-Giron said.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

There\u2019s another potential scenario: If there\u2019s a vacancy before November 2008 and no provision exists in the Constitution for replacing the lieutenant governor, Vigil-Giron said there would be a special election tacked on next November. The Republicans could also put someone on the ticket, but Vigil-Giron said she would try to be the Democrat in the race.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Vigil-Giron said she believes the governor\u2019s campaign \u201cis going to explode\u201d and she thinks he has a good chance of winning enough of the early primaries that he can confidently step down from the governorship.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cIf it looks like a good, sure thing for him, then yeah, I think he\u2019d step down,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

There is still some probing of a $3 million shortfall in the secretary of state\u2019s office that resulted from expenses from last year\u2019s election, which was run by Vigil-Giron before term limits forced her to leave office at the end of the year. The Legislative Finance Committee, state attorney general, governor\u2019s administration and federal auditors are all looking into the situation.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The questions surround whether Vigil-Giron inappropriately overspent her state budget and whether she misspent federal funds.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Vigil-Giron said New Mexico<\/st1:place><\/st1:state> is one of 25 states being audited by the federal government and that they\u2019re standard audits, not the result of allegations of wrongdoing. As to the state investigations, she said she doesn\u2019t expect anything to come of them.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Vigil-Giron contends that the Legislature required a shift to paper ballots and didn\u2019t provide $4 million that was in the original bill, so it was an unfunded mandate. She says lawmakers told her to come back after the election and request the funds to pay for it \u2013 which is what she did with an emergency request just before she left office.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

News of the shortfall broke around the same time the governor appointed Vigil-Giron earlier this year to head the state film office. Under pressure from Republicans and others, the governor put the appointment on hold and ordered his administration\u2019s review of the situation.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Vigil-Giron told me today she\u2019s no longer interested in the film job, saying the woman who currently runs the office, India Hatch, is doing a good job. Vigil-Giron says she expects Richardson<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> to give her another job soon.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re negotiating for something else right now,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

She wouldn\u2019t elaborate, saying it\u2019s \u201ckind of sensitive,\u201d but said the position might be in the governor\u2019s administration or might be working for his campaign.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Former Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron wants to be lieutenant governor. You might be thinking that she\u2019s looking to get on a ticket in 2010. Vigil-Giron, however, is thinking about next year. She told me that during the Democrats\u2019 convention in Las Cruces today. There isn\u2019t currently a way in state law to replace the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1651","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=1651"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1651\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}