{"id":2419,"date":"2007-10-23T16:11:00","date_gmt":"2007-10-23T22:11:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/10\/rawson-to-announce-congress-decision-on-wednesday\/"},"modified":"2007-10-23T16:11:00","modified_gmt":"2007-10-23T22:11:00","slug":"rawson-to-announce-congress-decision-on-wednesday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/10\/rawson-to-announce-congress-decision-on-wednesday\/","title":{"rendered":"Rawson to announce Congress decision on Wednesday"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>State Sen. Leonard Lee Rawson<\/a>, R-Las Cruces, will announce on Wednesday whether he is running for the congressional seat being vacated by U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce<\/a>, R-N.M. <\/p>\n

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

Rawson sent me an e-mail today stating that he\u2019ll send a news release on Wednesday announcing his decision. I called him, and asked whether he would also hold a news conference. He said he hasn\u2019t \u201cfinalized all the details yet,\u201d but said the announcement will come sometime in the afternoon.<\/p>\n

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

Rawson, the owner of Rawson Inc. Builders Supply<\/a> in Las Cruces<\/st1:city>, is the Senate minority whip and the only Republican legislator from Do\u00f1a<\/st1:placename> Ana<\/st1:placename> County<\/st1:placename><\/st1:place>. He has the potential to be a formidable candidate. He\u2019s been in the Senate 20 years and is a conservative Republican who would secure much of the east-side support that made Pearce so strong. Since he\u2019s from Las Cruces<\/st1:city>, Rawson could also secure important support in Do\u00f1a<\/st1:placename> Ana<\/st1:placename> County<\/st1:placename><\/st1:place>.<\/p>\n

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

It\u2019s also notable that Rawson\u2019s Senate district overlaps part of the House district of state Rep. Joseph Cervantes<\/a>, a Las Cruces Democrat who is also considering the congressional race. Rawson\u2019s decision might have an impact on that of Cervantes, who has said he\u2019ll announce whether he\u2019s running for Congress before Nov. 4.<\/p>\n

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

I asked Rawson today if he could provide any clues about his decision, and he chuckled. All I can tell you is that the e-mail he sent to me was also sent as a carbon copy to Diane Kinderwater, who was former Gov. Gary Johnson\u2019s press secretary but now works for Republicans in the state Senate.<\/p>\n

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

Why? You tell me, but maybe she\u2019s going to handle press for a Rawson congressional campaign. In addition, if Rawson is even thinking about holding a news conference \u2013 he didn\u2019t discount the possibility when I asked about it today \u2013 I\u2019d say this: Conventional wisdom suggests you don\u2019t hold a news conference to announce that you\u2019re not going to do something.<\/p>\n

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

But I\u2019m just speculating. Republican sources I\u2019ve spoken with don\u2019t know whether Rawson is running.<\/p>\n

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

Three Democrats have already entered the race: Al Kissling<\/a>, Do\u00f1a Ana County Commissioner Bill McCamley<\/a> and former Lea County Commissioner Harry Teague<\/a>. Several other Democrats and Republicans are considering running for the seat, which Pearce is vacating because he\u2019s running for the Senate seat being vacated by Pete Domenici<\/a>, but no Republican has yet entered the race.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

State Sen. Leonard Lee Rawson, R-Las Cruces, will announce on Wednesday whether he is running for the congressional seat being vacated by U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce, R-N.M. Rawson sent me an e-mail today stating that he\u2019ll send a news release on Wednesday announcing his decision. I called him, and asked whether he would also hold […]<\/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-2419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2419","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=2419"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2419\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}