{"id":41092,"date":"2012-06-27T07:18:02","date_gmt":"2012-06-27T13:18:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=41092"},"modified":"2012-06-28T08:16:20","modified_gmt":"2012-06-28T14:16:20","slug":"gop-senate-candidate-slams-martinez","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2012\/06\/gop-senate-candidate-slams-martinez\/","title":{"rendered":"GOP Senate candidate slams Martinez"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Republican

Republican state Senate candidate Aubrey L. Dunn Jr. <\/p><\/div>\n

After receiving a request from Gov. Susana Martinez\u2019s PAC for a donation, Republican state Senate candidate Aubrey L. Dunn Jr. demanded a refund of the contributions he and his wife gave to her gubernatorial campaign.<\/h4>\n

Republican state Senate candidate Aubrey L. Dunn Jr. is blasting Gov. Susana Martinez<\/a> after a political group with ties to the governor sent mailers in the June primary supporting the incumbent Democrat Dunn will face in November.<\/p>\n

Dunn is also demanding a refund of contributions he and his wife made to Martinez\u2019s 2010 gubernatorial campaign.<\/p>\n

Dunn sent the letter<\/a> to Martinez on Sunday complaining about mailers<\/a> the political action committee sent before the June primary in support of Sen. Phil Griego<\/a>, D-San Jose, who faced a tough but ultimately unsuccessful challenge<\/a> from more liberal Democrat Jack Sullivan. The Martinez-tied Super PAC, Reform New Mexico Now, came to the aid of a number of Democrats<\/a> in the primary who had been supportive of some of the governor\u2019s legislative proposals.<\/p>\n

The Super PAC\u2019s funding came primarily from wealthy oilmen from Eastern New Mexico.<\/p>\n

In his letter, Dunn blasted the governor and the PAC\u2019s donors, pointing out that Griego voted for the law that allows undocumented immigrants to obtain driver\u2019s licenses.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt appears that the Governor\u2019s office and her Big Oil friends are more concerned about the open pit rules and helping a \u2018pay to play\u2019 senator,\u201d Dunn wrote.<\/p>\n

Jay McCleskey, Martinez\u2019s political adviser, didn\u2019t say whether the governor would return the campaign contributions Dunn referenced from him and his wife. NMPolitics.net found $5,250 in contributions from Dunn to Martinez in 2010, but none from his wife Robin \u2013 who contributed $1,000 to Martinez\u2019s 2010 primary opponent Doug Turner.<\/p>\n

McCleskey also didn\u2019t rule out Martinez supporting Griego in the general election.<\/p>\n

\u201cGovernor Martinez has not made any endorsement in the general election,\u201d McCleskey said. \u201cWhile they don\u2019t agree on everything, Senator Griego supported many of the governor\u2019s education and tax reforms to help move New Mexico forward, in stark contrast to the obstructionist positions of his Democratic opponent in the primary.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Disingenuous at best\u2019<\/h3>\n

Dunn\u2019s letter came after he received a request from Martinez\u2019s other political action committee, Susana PAC<\/a>, for a donation. The letter<\/a> from Susana PAC states that Republicans can take control of the N.M. House this year, and complains about liberal groups that tried to finance the unseating of conservative Democrats in this year\u2019s primary.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut a funny thing happened,\u201d the letter states. \u201cNew Mexico Democrats voted in their primaries and defeated these liberal groups and their radical candidates. \u2026 Conservative, common sense New Mexico values are winning the day in the battle of messages.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dunn wasn\u2019t happy with the letter.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour letter is disingenuous at best, after your PAC, Reform New Mexico Now, funded by Big Oil out of Artesia, placed positive ads for my democrat (SIC) opponent Phil Griego,\u201d Dunn\u2019s letter to Martinez states.<\/p>\n

Dunn gave money to Richardson<\/h3>\n

But Dunn has his own history of supporting a Democrat in a primary. As NMPolitics.net reported<\/a> when Dunn ran for Congress in 2008, the rancher left the Republican Party in 2007, becoming an independent, and gave the maximum allowed by law \u2013 $2,300 at the time \u2013 to Democrat Bill Richardson\u2019s presidential campaign.<\/p>\n

At the time, Dunn told NMPolitics.net he gave the money as \u201ca vote against Hillary.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI really don\u2019t think we could take another eight years of the Clinton White House. On the Democratic side I\u2019d really like to see anyone other than Hillary,\u201d Dunn told NMPolitics.net in 2008, while the presidential primary was still ongoing.<\/p>\n

He pointed out that he also maxed out to Republican Fred Thompson in the 2008 presidential race.<\/p>\n

Is that different than what the Martinez-supporting Super PAC did \u2013 coming to the aid of conservative Democrats in an attempt to keep more liberal Democrats out of the Legislature? Dunn said it is different, and one of the main reasons is that Dunn isn\u2019t a Republican Party leader. He pointed out that he wasn\u2019t a registered Republican when he gave money to Richardson.<\/p>\n

Dunn also said Martinez is \u201cmeddling\u201d by trying to influence people to donate to her PAC under one premise and then \u201cturning around to support unsatisfactory candidates of an opposing party.\u201d Martinez ran on a platform of reform, but Griego represents the status quo, Dunn said, while he will support her platform.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Republican state Senate candidate Aubrey L. Dunn Jr. is blasting Gov. Susana Martinez after a political group with ties to the governor sent mailers in the June primary supporting the incumbent Democrat Dunn will face in November.<\/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":[156,107,208],"class_list":["post-41092","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-2012-election","tag-roundhouse","tag-susana-martinez"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41092","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=41092"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41092\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41092"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41092"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41092"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}