Albuquerque Journal<\/a> that reported that a top aide to Lujan has been living rent-free in a home owned by the Region III Housing Authority.<\/p>\nIt\u2019s the first time Lujan has been publicly linked to the housing authority scandal, and one of many issues with Lujan\u2019s leadership that has some House Democrats upset.<\/p>\n
When the legislature convenes in January, Do\u00f1a Ana County will have seven Democratic members in the House \u2013 a significant group in the 70-member body.<\/p>\n
Rep. Mary Helen Garcia of Las Cruces refused to comment this week on whether she supports Lujan, but said she is \u201cdisappointed with the headlines about our speaker. We have to have trust in our speaker, and if any of this was taking place behind closed doors, I\u2019m not alright with it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rep. Joni Gutierrez of Las Cruces, on the other hand, expressed support for Lujan.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m very satisfied with him. I\u2019ve had no problems,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019ve been there two years, and he\u2019s all I know. He\u2019s been fine. I think he\u2019s good.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rep. Andy Nu\u00f1ez of Hatch declined to comment. Reps. Joseph Cervantes and Antonio Lujan of Las Cruces have not returned calls seeking comment.<\/p>\n
Representative-elect Jeff Steinborn of Las Cruces said he\u2019s been too busy to think about whether he supports Ben Lujan continuing as speaker. He was in Santa Fe this week looking for a home, and said he has been \u201cinundated\u201d with phone calls and other issues.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not a decision I\u2019m going to make just yet,\u201d Steinborn said. \u201cIt\u2019s something that warrants more study.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve also been unable to reach Representative-elect Nate Cote of Las Cruces for comment.<\/p>\n
In addition, I\u2019ve tried to reach House Majority Leader Ken Martinez of Grants to ask whether he\u2019ll challenge Lujan. He has not returned my calls. Neither has one other House Democrat I\u2019m told is a possible challenger. Because that member\u2019s name has not been given to me on the record, I\u2019m not going to name the member.<\/p>\n
Does anyone else get the sense there\u2019s a lot going on behind the scenes here? If Lujan had the widespread support he claims, it would be easier to get people on the record in support of him continuing as speaker.<\/p>\n
The question is whether anyone will challenge him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Democratic representatives from Do\u00f1a Ana County appear to have mixed reactions to the question of whether Ben Lujan should continue as speaker of the House. I\u2019ve been asking the question all week, following a Monday article in the Albuquerque Journal that reported that a top aide to Lujan has been living rent-free in a home […]<\/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-915","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/915","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=915"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/915\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=915"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=915"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=915"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/photos1.blogger.com\/blogger2\/6506\/2852\/200\/Lujan%2C%20Ben.2.jpg\")
Democratic representatives from Do\u00f1a Ana County appear to have mixed reactions to the question of whether Ben Lujan should continue as speaker of the House.<\/p>\n