Funding for New Mexico in Focus is provided by: Viewers Like You >> Nash: This week on New Mexico in Focus all eyes on Trump's authoritarian immigration crackdown, including those watching from the Roundhouse >> Rubio: New Mexico, should just not be in the business of incarcerating people for profit.

We just, as a state, have to decide that this is not the kind of economy that we want to build for New Mexico.

>> Nash: Plus, the push to set the state's climate goals into hard stone is on again in Santa Fe.

New Mexico in Focus starts now Thanks for joining us I'm Nash Jones.

The hum in the halls of the State Capitol started to grow louder this week, as the sprint of a 30 day legislative session lurched into a stride.

It's the last regular session for termed-out Democratic Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, and she's got a wish list of issues that wants addressed before the Chief Executive Carriage turns into a pumpkin.

Those include stamping Lujan Grisham's goals to address climate change, laid out way back in 2017, into state law.

You'll hear a few perspectives on what's known as the Clear Horizons Act, and its prospects to finally pass this year, a little later in the hour.

And speaking of the environment, journalist Jerry Redfern is back this week to get a little oily, that is, to catch up on the bills focused on the state's biggest cash cow and its biggest polluter.

You'll hear Jerry's chat with Executive Producer Jeff Proctor, a bit later, too.

But we begin with the issue that is top of mind for many of you and for many lawmakers as well; immigration.

[New Mexico] in Focus reporter Cailley Chella brings us to the sights, sounds and emotions of this year's Immigrant and Worker Day of Action in Santa Fe.

You'll see that story in just a few minutes.

The rally came as the country grapples with ICE agents gunning down two U.S.

citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, in Minneapolis earlier this month.

The killings that prompted massive nationwide protests.

I made it out to one in Albuquerque just last weekend.

It's all over a thousand people marching and demanding change.

And more recently, public outrage around Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents brutal tactics has caused some infighting and even a bit of circular firing squad in Trump land.

Here at home, the majority Democratic Party has sought ways to protect immigrants and push back on Trump's deportation machine at or near the top of their list, getting New Mexico out of the deportation business.

A bill that would ban public entities from contracting with ICE to lock up immigrants seems finely poised to pass both chambers of the legislature in the Capital this week.

I caught up with two sponsors of House Bill Nine.

The Immigrant Safety Act, Democratic Representatives Eleanor Chávez of Albuquerque and Angelica Rubio of Las Cruces.

>> Nash: Representative, thanks so much for the time.

>> Chávez: You're welcome.

>> Nash: So this bill prohibits public bodies, like local governments from entering into renewing or maintaining contracts for immigrant detention.

What does that mean for the three existing immigrant prisons in New Mexico?

>> Chávez: What it means for them is that they would have to cease their contracts with, with ICE.

And it's my understanding that each of the contracts has a different end date.

So when that end date comes up, they would need to -- they could not renew there -- >> Nash: Any sense of when those and dates are for the three contracts that exist?

>> Chávez: Honestly I don't -- >> Nash: That's okay.

According to the most recent numbers, the two immigrant prisons in New Mexico that are owned and run by CoreCivic, a private company, that's in Torrance and Cibola counties, hold more than 650 people a day on average.

If the result of these contracts ending is that those facilities closed down, what happens to the people who are held there?

>> Chávez: The people who are held there could either be released.

We know that many of them have no criminal history.

So they could be released, or they could be transferred to other centers.

>> Nash: Okay.

Other centers, meaning other immigrant detention centers in the country?

>> Chávez: Out of state.

>> Nash: Out of state.

Okay.

The third immigrant prison in New Mexico, the one in Otero County, is owned by the county.

But it's privately operated by a management and training corporation, M.T.C., if that ICE contract ends, does that facility then become a county jail for Otero?

>> Chávez: It depends on what the county wants to do with it.

>> Nash: Okay, but it could?

>> Chávez: It could.

>> Nash: It wouldn't necessarily close that entire facility.

>> Chávez: No, and the same with the other two facilities.

They also hold other prisoners other than immigrants and so that those operations would continue.

>> Nash: Even though CoreCivic owns the facilities.

>> Chávez: They could continue, yes.

>> Nash: Okay.

Now, if this bill passes, what's to keep a private company like CoreCivic from contracting directly with ICE?

And skipping the middleman, so to speak, of contracting with the county.

>> Chávez: There's nothing in this bill that prevents that.

This bill only speaks to public bodies.

>> Nash: So in that way, immigrant detention could persist in New Mexico through private companies contracting with the federal government.

>> Chávez: It could.

>> Nash: And if that happens because Core civic owns those facilities, would they be able to stay put in those facilities, or would they have to find their own new building?

Basically, >> Chávez: if they if they owned the buildings, they could stay put in the buildings.

But if not, then they would.

>> Nash: My understanding is that they do.

>> Chávez: Yeah, so they could stay put in there and enter into a contract with Ice.

And we're hoping that they don't do that, because that's not something that we want to see in New Mexico, which is why we're introducing this bill.

>> Nash: Are there any steps that the state could take, the legislature could take to prevent that?

>> Chávez: There may be, and we're, you know, looking into the possibilities, but as of right now, I don't know.

>> Nash: Okay now, what would you say to local officials?

I know many local officials in all three counties.

Torrance, Otero and Cibola, are concerned about the economic and the potential economic impacts, the impacts on tax revenue for the counties and, of course, jobs.

What's your message to them?

>> Chávez: So I think one of the things that we need to do is we need to look at jobs that are sustainable.

As you pointed out, CoreCivic could up and leave, at any moment.

And we really need to look at jobs that the community is interested in.

I know that there's been some conversations in Torrance County about what the community would like to see.

And I think.

>> Nash: Do you know what they were hearing from those folks, >> Chávez: I remember one of them was health care.

Health care.

They would like to see, you know, health care jobs.

They would like to see health care facilities in their area.

The others I there was something about manufacturing, but Torrance County is maybe a little bit difficult because of their water situation.

But other than that, you know, there's, there's other things that we can do that are sustainable for people in those communities.

We do know that Workforce Solutions has, programs available for people who lose their jobs in situations like this.

And so that's also something that, that those folks could take advantage of.

>> Rubio: You know, I, sympathize with what's happening or what could happen economic wise.

But I actually take offense, considering I grew up in a small town I grew up in, in southeastern New Mexico.

And one of the things that I hear a lot is that there's just nothing else in these rural communities.

And I take offense to that because I feel like there is opportunity.

New Mexico decided 30, 40 years ago that this was the economic plan that they wanted to develop by using bodies to, to to incarcerate people and to to make money off of that.

We need to remove ourselves from that and actually provide a sustainable economy for everyone.

And I'm committed to ensuring that I support those communities past the session, because >> Nash: What does that look like?

Does it mean, helping people prepare for a career change?

Connecting them to a new industry, bringing new industry into some of these small towns?

>> Rubio: Yes and also thinking about it in terms that are sustainable, because here in New Mexico, we all also have a history of, bringing in industry that can be very harmful, not only just to communities, but to land and to water.

And so I want us to be very thoughtful about what those industries look like and ensuring that we're centering, communities that have disproportionately been impacted by it all.

>> Nash: Your co-sponsor Representative Chávez.

I spoke with her, and she was saying that she had heard from community members in some of these communities that they were interested in health care, potentially hospitals, clinics, those kinds of things.

Are you hearing about any particular industries that people wish was in their community, besides the prison complex?

>> Rubio: Yeah, I mean, I think we just haven't given people an opportunity to reimagine something different for their own community.

And I feel like this is that opportunity to do that.

Like, yes, it's it's scary to pursue something like this, but I feel like this is an opportunity for people to reimagine something different.

And I welcome those conversations.

I'm certainly not going to let this go.

Beyond this legislation.

>> Nash: You've been working on this for ten years.

You say a very similar bill failed in the, Senate last year.

It passed.

The House, failed in the Senate.

I spoke with Senate Majority Leader Peter Wirth.

He says he's hopeful that it will pass in the Senate and that in large part, that's due to a change of heart, by Senator Cervantes Joe Cervantes, who's actually a co-sponsor now on this legislation.

Can you fill the public in on what kind of conversations happened ahead of the session to get the Senate to move on this?

>> Rubio: I think there were a lot of conversations, but I think I think the, the what we've been seeing nationally, has really, I think, impacted and tugged people at their hearts.

Like organizing is about changing hearts and minds.

And I feel like that's what we've been able to do over the course of the last decade is to this isn't just about one man, it's not about one administration.

It's about a system that has continued to, that we've engaged in.

And so, I'm an organizer.

I believe in the power of organizing, and it's required a lot of, of that.

And so it's ultimately been a change of hearts and minds.

>> Nash: And you talk about what's happening nationally right now, affecting hearts and minds.

I imagine that, of course, you're looking to Minnesota and what's happening on the ground there.

Two recent fatal shootings, residents there, a lot of the the protest and the pushback and, the messaging around, what's happening there is focused on Ice agents on the ground in people's neighborhoods, separating families, arresting people, shooting and killing people.

If this bill is around detention facilities in the state, what can the state do to address protecting New Mexicans from Ice agents on the street?

>> Rubio: I think that over the course of the next few days, today, likely there will be an amendment to our bill to, to enhance language that would help to support some of that stuff.

And so, I would I would very much pay attention to the coming days to see how that outlook is.

But I definitely believe that we should not allow local law enforcement to interact with federal agents if and when, that happens.

And so my hope is, is that that is something that we can work on.

Over the course of the next couple of weeks >> Nash: In this session.

>> Rubio: Yes.

>> Nash: Would you need a new message from the governor to get that done?

>> Rubio: Yes.

>> Nash: Okay and any sense of whether that's possible?

>> Rubio: I think it is.

I'm feeling really hopeful about it.

>> Nash: Now a quick update on what you just heard.

After we spoke with the sponsors, a House committee on Wednesday evening amended the Bill to also ban agreements between local law enforcement and ICE.

Among the arguments against that bill centers around Basically, the thinking is that many would be lost if the ICE prisons in Cibola, Torrance and and Otero counties were shuttered.

Do you hear more about the potential impacts on those communities?

I spent a few minutes with Cibola County Manager Kate Fletcher, who offered a pretty nuanced perspective on her government's relationship with ICE, and the role that prisons play where she lives.

>> Nash: County Manager, thank you so much for your time and for sharing your perspective with us on this bill.

We're talking about the Immigrant Safety Act.

What is your take on what that would mean for Cibola County?

>> Fletcher: Thank you very much for having me.

It is huge.

We don't have anything else, but three prisons.

So I can honestly tell you that this this county is a prison county.

We have three prisons.

Everybody that we know, everybody I know is either related to somebody that works there or knows somebody.

We're talking about 200 jobs lost.

>> Nash: What's to keep CoreCivic from, say, contracting with Ice directly and maintaining that facility?

>> Fletcher: I would love that to happen.

That would work for the jobs.

Absolutely.

>> Nash: Now, I've been talking with some sponsors of this legislation, who say that Cibola County should be given a chance to have a more sustainable economy than the prison industry.

What's your reaction to that message?

>> Fletcher: I agree.

We work in it every time, every day, every month.

We have a lack of water for having large companies come in.

So we don't really have -- the want for people to move here.

Move in.

>> Nash: So you would like to diversify the industries -- >> Fletcher: Oh yeah, absolutely.

Right now, though, it's prisons and we have families.

That that's their career.

And they live there and there's 200 of them.

>> Nash: Now I spoke with, lead sponsor of the bill, representative Eleanor Chávez.

She was saying that the infrastructure already exists through the Department of Workforce Solutions.

And, state infrastructure to support residents who work at the prison to shift careers, whether that's, placing them elsewhere, getting them prepared for a career shift.

What are your thoughts about, the sponsor saying we will take care of the people and make sure that they have new opportunity?

>> Fletcher: If that's true, I would love to see it, but a lot of families have lived there all their lives and they won't want to move.

>> Nash: Have you been in touch with CoreCivic at all about what their plans would be if this bill becomes law?

>> Fletcher: Yes.

And I have also been in contact with ICE.

They are very frank with me.

Very candid.

They're worried that if they contract, if the House Bill nine passes, they will not be able to continue working at keeping that facility open.

They will decide to go somewhere else.

They've got a lot of facilities everywhere.

Everywhere.

>> Nash: So they are saying that they likely won't contract with the federal government directly and keep that facility.

>> Fletcher: No, they're planning on hoping.

They hope.

But it's all verbal they'll have to wait.

But again, I don't think we need to hope.

We need to have a plan.

And that's where I'm coming from.

I need to help my community, my members of the community that live there.

Where are they going to work?

Where are they going to live?

What's going to happen and what's going to happen to all of the community?

>> Nash: Thank you for sharing your perspective.

>> Fletcher: Thank you very much.

>> Nash: Thank you to Cibola County Manager Kate Fletcher.

On Monday, hundreds of people from across the state gathered in Santa Fe for the 2026 Immigrant and Worker Day of Action.

A group from Farmington traveled hours to make sure that lawmakers heard their community's voice.

Reporter Cailley Chella was there as they rallied for safety privacy and a safe place in New Mexico's future.

>> Cailley: It's 8 a.m.

in Santa Fe, and the farmers market is brimming with folks concerned about their friends and neighbors.

[Applause] The Day, organized by about a dozen different advocacy groups, happens every year.

But this year, the air feels different.

Tensions are higher, and what's at stake feels bigger.

>> Cailley: The morning begins with a training on how a bill becomes law, how to talk to your representatives, and how to safely march and rally.

>> Cailley: Organizers also walk through this year's priorities the Immigrant Safety Act, the Driver Privacy and Safety Act, making permanent the Office of New Americans and expanding funds for legal services and workplace development.

Afterwards, the crowd makes the 15 minute walk to the Capitol for a rally aimed at lawmakers.

[Crowd chanting] >> Cailley The energy is high.

Optimistic, even.

Part community care, part call to action.

But underneath it all is a clear sense of urgency.

Just days earlier, ICE agents fatally shot VA nurse, Alex Pretti in the streets of Minneapolis and 17 days before.

Writer and mother of three, Renee Good.

>> Silva: I cannot support a government that does that to its people.

And I will not support our state being complicit in eroding our democracy.

>> Cailley: It's freezing outside about 20 degrees, and people had been bused in from all over the state, but the crowd, endures.

[Crowd chanting] >> Cailley: Afterwards, each group makes their way inside the Roundouse.

Among them is a small contingent from Farmington, where the economy is driven by the oil and gas industry and the largely Hispanic and Latino workers who power it.

Jorge Rivera, an oilfield worker originally from Morelos, Mexico, has lived in Farmington for over 15 years.

He says he took the day off from work to meet with his representatives because his community doesn't feel safe.

>> Rivera: We feel like, unsafe because, you know, because we saw what happened in this country and we are afraid.

>> Cailley: The Farmington group is primarily pushing for two bills, the Immigrant Safety Act, HB nine, and the Driver and Privacy Safety Act, SB 40, which would restrict law enforcement from sharing data from automated license plate readers, with ICE.

>> Hernandez: That's why I feel it's important that we get as many people to sign onto House Bill Nine to send a strong message that we ain't going to put up with this stuff.

You know, here in New Mexico.

>> Cailley: For Rocio Valencia, a nurse who grew up in Farmington.

It's about human rights and the trauma being inflicted on her community.

She points to the killing of Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse, as a breaking point.

>> Valencia: I know the mental strength and the compassion you have to have to be an ICU nurse because we are literally saving people every minute that we're there with them.

So for him to even be defending veterans or saving veterans and for these people just to go shoot him is absurd.

And it's enraging.

So you piss off nurses.

You have screwed up.

>> Cailley: She's also concerned about how ice shows up here at home.

>> Valencia: No one should stay in a prison where they're charging you $5 for a call, but paying you $5 for a full week.

That's slavery right there.

So no, it should be Due Process.

Not taking three years to get a process.

And if you're saying that this is because of deportation, that you're wanting to deport these people, then deport them.

Keeping them locked up and doing slave labor is not how we're going to do things right here.

>> Cailley: Sarah Silva represents House District 53, which includes parts of Otero County, home to one of the state's three detention centers.

And she agrees.

>> Silva: So today I had about 50 constituents from Chaparral where Otero County Processing Center is, and they were all completely in support of HB Nine.

And they were saying, this is not the kind of business or industry that we want in our community, and we should be divesting as a state.

I am completely in support of HB nine.

And that's not the way that I would want our state to run it's economy is based on all of these atrocities that we're seeing come out of ICE.

And CBP, >> Cailley: In her personal connection to the day makes it that much more meaningful.

>> Silva: My grandfather was a Bracero.

Literally, the Bracero Program was called, ARMS.

That's what Bracero means.

And so really, that's all we wanted from farmworkers, were their ARMS.

And when we talk about Immigrant Day of Action, we want people to see the whole person and see them as human, see them as family members, as mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, neighbors.

>> Cailley: As things wind down in the hallways of the Roundhouse, Valencia says she's accomplished her mission.

She came to tell the state that they are more than just arms for the oil field, or staff for the hospitals.

They are the backbone of New Mexico, and they demand a future where they can finally feel safe.

>> Valencia: I want my legislators to know that they -- are here for us, that they are here for us, and that they need to listen to us.

All of this works because of us.

>> Cailley: For New Mexico in Focus, I'm Cailley Chella, reporting.

>> Nash: Thank you to Cailley and to everyone who spoke to her during the rally.

We will be keeping an eye on immigrant related bills as they work their way through the Roundhouse.

So earlier this month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reversed course on decades of institutional knowledge and changed its vaccine recommendations for children.

It used to be that the CDC recommended shots against 17 diseases.

Now, that number is down to 11.

The shift has puzzled medical experts, and it leaves the CDC at odds with longtime partner, the American Academy of Pediatrics.

This is all happening, by the way, amid an alarming flu season.

To try and unravel the confusion and break down what all this means for New Mexico families, Senior Producer Lou DiVizio sat down with Doctor Miranda Durham, the Chief Medical Officer for the State Department of Health.

>> Lou: Doctor Durham, good to see you again and thanks so much for being here again on New Mexico in Focus.

>> Durham: Nice to see you.

Thanks for having me.

>> Lou: Yeah, of course.

Now, last time you were here, we talked in the fall about some of the federal changes around vaccines, how they might impact us here in New Mexico.

There was a lot of uncertainty then.

There's still some uncertainty, but some things have gotten cleared up.

I'll get to that soon.

But I want to start with the flu.

We're in the middle of the flu season.

What are we seeing here in New Mexico?

>> Durham: Yeah, we're seeing a pretty tough flu year.

It's largely influenza A, there's influenza A and B, but right now, what's driving disease is influenza A, and, it's a slightly different variant.

Looks it spreads quickly.

Our numbers are super high.

We're probably about 30% higher on ER visits than we were last year.

And that's largely in kids.

Well, not largely, but a good chunk of those are kids under 18.

And also seeing hospitalizations start to go up.

And those are largely in people 65 and over.

>> Lou: Okay.

>> Durham: I would say on the ER visits we're starting to see a little, like maybe easing off a bit, but still high levels.

And you know, we're not even halfway through the flu season yet.

>> Lou: Right.

Sorry to spring this on you without giving you time to research, but 30% increase in ER visits over one year.

Is that?

>> Durham: Yeah.

So the peak times that peak was 30% higher.

>> Lou: Is that normal?

Have you seen an increase like that?

That seems pretty high.

>> Durham: So I mean flu is so variable year to year.

And I think it just speaks to kind of a combination of a tough flu virus.

And under vaccination in the state.

>> Lou: Yeah.

Let's talk about vaccinations.

Starting with the flu.

When last we spoke, it was unclear if the Trump administration's decision not to recommend the flu or Covid vaccines would lead to fewer people getting vaccinated.

Have you?

Do you have any data on that over the last couple of months?

>> Durham: Yeah, it's probably a multifactorial problem.

And the, what we have seen over the last couple of years nationally is a slow decline in flu vaccination across all age groups.

>> Lou: Okay >> Durham: Throw on to that a little more confusion about whether flu shots will be covered or not, which they are covered by all insurance and Medicare.

But but that combination, we did see a drop off in New Mexico in flu rates.

So we were about 27% across the board vaccinated last year for flu.

Now it's hit between 23 and 25%.

I have to say what always happens, but the procrastinators do tend to start to get vaccinated as the flu rolls into town and people are getting sick.

And so what I'm comparing is the total last year to kind of midway through the season this year.

So, you know, we may we may catch up.

>> Lou: Now, earlier this month, the CDC changed its vaccine recommendations for children.

And this is over a wide range of vaccines.

Previously, it had recommended, vaccines against 17 diseases.

Now that number is down to 11.

Those guidelines remove the shots of hepatitis A Hepatitis B, as we know, Covid flu.

A few others.

First off, what does this mean for expecting parents or parents of young children in New Mexico?

Can they still get these vaccines for their kids?

>> Durham: So yeah, it has been really confusing for people, I think, to try to follow this, but the CDC has always given their suggestion about the best vaccine schedule.

It's always been up to states to decide which ones we want to recommend for school, and just adopting a vaccination schedule that is right for New Mexico.

So in this case, you know, there is no new safety data presented.

There is no new efficacy data presented.

And so there really was no reason to make a change.

So we've stayed with the schedule that existed prior to the change, so that the state health department has and I think a lot of our providers are too, because there's just still so many moving parts on the new schedule.

In the end, with the new schedule from the CDC, a parent can at parent and child can get the same set of vaccines that they've always had access to.

I think it's just kind of reorganized so that a chunk of the vaccines, like you said, hepatitis A, hepatitis B, meningococcal, which present prevents against meningitis.

Some of those are now in that shared clinical decision making bucket.

So they they have three buckets of vaccines.

The first one is recommend it for everybody.

The second bucket is recommended for high risk.

And the third bucket is shared clinical decision making.

Talk to your doctor your nurse practitioner, your pharmacist before, getting the vaccine.

>> Lou: Okay.

With those vaccines now being in that shared decision making bucket, does that affect supply at all for our state?

>> Durham: It really shouldn't.

Again, insurance is still covering all of those vaccines.

And that was very clear even from the CDC messaging.

But also, our Medicaid agency and our office of the Superintendent of Insurance, everyone has reassured that these vaccines will continue to be covered.

So it really shouldn't affect supply in New Mexico.

>> Lou: Okay.

With all of this movement.

Even just sitting down today, you and your PIO, thankfully, informed me of changes with the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Changes is wrong.

A new release of information.

Those guidelines are staying the same.

The point being, there are a lot of moving parts for someone who spent time preparing for this interview, even to understand right?

For the average parent, do you have to be a public health expert to care for your child properly?

Because that's the fear that I even get as a new parent is.

What if I forget to bring up a specific disease that's now not recommended?

Will the doctor not bring it up?

How do I make sure that my child is protected in a way that children here have been protected for decades?

How do parents approach that?

>> Durham: Yeah, I think that's a great question, because shared clinical decision making is a two way street, as you point out.

And, so it's possible in a busy office that people, you know, will they overlook it?

I think, our providers in New Mexico and I can't speak for all of them, but, certainly at the Department of Health and, our pediatric society, we've just had a lot of support from maintaining the American Academy of Pediatrics vaccine schedule.

So for years, I mean, the American Academy of Pediatrics has been recommending vaccines since like 1938.

I think it's their first.

They recommend vaccines in the, in their red book, and they've been publishing since somewhere in the 1930s.

They were really the first to make vaccine recommendations to providers.

And then for years, the ACIP and the American Academy of Pediatrics, the CDC and the American Academy of Pediatrics schedules lined up.

And now we have two different schedules.

But again, most of our EHRs have stayed the same.

Our statewide immunization database, Nims, is that has stayed the same.

So I think there are a lot of and our school vaccine schedule isn't changing.

So again, kids get a lot of vaccines before they come to school.

But I think there are a lot of places, checks and balances in the system where a parent can be reminded about the choices that they have to make.

>> Lou: Okay.

I'm hearing that practically not much is changing at this point.

But what do these mixed messages from multiple federal health agencies, what does that do for trust in public health systems?

And eventually, if not this year or next year, down the line, erosion of trust in public health?

>> Durham: Yeah, I think confusion is always bad for trust in anything.

And, fortunately, I think what we know is that people still do have trust in their providers and their pediatrician nurse practitioner, again, their pharmacists.

And so I think this is a good time to really lean on that relationship, to get questions answered.

You know, the Department of Health, we do have a helpline with nurses on who are also great at talking about vaccines and happy to answer questions if people if people have questions.

>> Lou: Okay.

Yeah, thanks.

Now, you mentioned New Mexico has its own health department recommendations for vaccines.

Other states like California, Oregon and Washington, they formed something called the West Coast Health Alliance.

So they make unified decisions together and recommendations.

The governor's Public Health Alliance is a similar effort of 15 states.

As the chief medical officer with the state health department, have you or would you ever push for New Mexico to join a multi-state alliance like these states have?

>> Durham: Yeah, I think the good thing in these times is all states are working together, whether formally part of alliances or not.

And, you know, that decision is more of a governor's decision when we're talking about the Western Health Alliance.

So, so we certainly are leaning on our other colleagues, like you pointed out about, I think over half the states, I think it's 28 less counted have decided to stick with, the American Academy of Pediatrics vaccine schedule because it is the one that we've used all along.

And, is, you know, there's good science behind it.

>> Lou: Sure.

We talked a little bit about distrust in public health systems.

What can you, as the chief medical officer or your department, more largely due to address this perception and growing perception of distrust?

>> Durham: Yeah, I think one thing I just always want to correct is nationally, there's still the majority of parents that believe in vaccines and feel that vaccines are important in keeping our kids safe.

So I guess to push back a little on the we do know that trust is eroding.

I think you're right.

And the numbers drop, but still the majority of parents believe in vaccines.

But it is a tough problem.

I mean, there's so much information out there and you know, how do you tell people, look at this and not this?

I think one of the, so I really appreciate having conversations with people because I think that ability to, to sit and talk and, and truly answer questions.

I think that's going to have to be our campaign.

I also think the interesting thing and, you know, I'm showing my age a little bit on this, but is just for for those of us who have seen kids die from these diseases and, and there are still people telling stories about having had polio as a kid and it's affect, you know, affected them the rest of their life.

It's hard now that we've had such success from vaccines, that we don't have a lot of those stories anymore.

But the measles outbreak this summer, I think was another reminder.

You know, we have good control of these diseases with the vaccines that we have, but we we haven't eliminated them.

They'll come back if we let off the gas.

>> Lou: Right.

Well, thank you so much, doctor.

Dr.

Durham >> Durham: Yeah.

Thank you.

>> Nash: Thanks again to Lou and Dr.

Durham for that conversation.

Democratic State Senator Mimi Stewart of Albuquerque has been trying for six years to chisel Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham's climate goals into state law for last year's session, and this year's, that effort has lived under the banner of the Clear Horizons Act, with the Trump administration taking a bulldozer to environmental protections.

[New Mexico] in Focus politics correspondent Gwyneth Dolan, asked Senator Stewart why she thinks this might finally be the year to notch a legacy accomplishment for her and for the governor.

>> Gwyneth: Senator Stewart, thank you so much for spending this time with us today We want to talk about Clear Horizons.

You have brought this before.

What's different this year?

>> Stewart: You know, Gwyneth, we've actually been trying to do this bill for six years.

Because this bill, codifies the governor's executive order.

All codify needs it, puts it into statute.

So when the governor arrived in 2019, she set up an executive order.

That was very exciting for many of us.

Realizing the difficulty of the extreme weather that we were going to get and we were getting, she put in place greenhouse gas emission targets that she wanted us to reach.

So by 2030, we want to have 45% less than 2005 emissions, by 2040, We want 75% less.

And by 2050, we all want to be at net zero.

There are also the emission targets that the biggest oil companies have all agreed to in their national and international organizations that they have.

So, Clear Horizons Act this year is shorter and leaner and easier to understand.

I had trouble a little bit last year with some of the technical issues in that bill.

So this year, anybody can read this and understand what we're trying to do.

>> Gwyneth: Critics might say that it's, you know, watered down too much.

Other critics say, on the oil and gas side that it goes too far.

Do you feel like you've hit a happy medium here?

>> Stewart: I do, and let me tell you what, we've all been under that executive order for seven years.

The industry has been under the under the executive order.

They've at least improved their methane reduction.

We set in place a methane rule where they had to reach a certain amount, a certain number of years.

They didn't want to do that.

They finally came to the table and methane has been reduced in the Permian Basin.

And, you know, then everybody said, oh my God, you're trying to get rid of oil and gas.

They're all going to leave production doubled.

After the methane rule, we've put a floor.

We didn't have one last year.

So we're not going to require this kind of work on greenhouse gas emission reduction for any, organization.

That's under 10,000 metric tons.

That's a lot of emissions.

But even with this floor, we're still going to try to capture about 97%.

So this is small farm small ag.

Individual communities.

That is not what we're looking at.

We've tried to lessen the specificity that we had last year.

Really, we've got great state agencies.

The Farm department is really the lead.

Energy minerals is right behind them.

They've both set up, climate bureaus, and we have projects all over the state that are trying to lower greenhouse gas emissions.

The Energy and minerals has told us that they're about to, send out $90 million worth of grants around the state with our community benefits Fund, which lines up with the Clear Horizon Act.

So we're all working on this.

Everybody's pulling in.

There's really exciting things in agriculture.

They can do just a few things and their emissions go down.

>> Gwyneth: Well, I wanted to ask you.

I mean, there is a lot going on, as you just said, but still, it sounds like it could be in part, a heavy lift.

The legislative analysis says that there's the potential for significant revenue loss, but they couldn't say exactly how much.

I'm wondering if you think that should be quantified before a vote on this.

Is it important to know how much we're going to lose in oil and gas revenue, given that that's so important for the state's bottom line?

>> Stewart: Gwyneth, we're not going to lose any oil and gas revenue.

The word is that the oil in the Permian Basin is what we call sweet oil.

It barely needs refining.

We're the second largest producer in the country.

No one is walking away from the sweet Permian oil.

No one is going to do that.

They always say that.

They always are going to lose all these jobs.

Nothing in the bill will make that happen.

I can tell you what we have quantified $256 million last year that we didn't put in the budget, that the governor had to spend to take care of the burn scars and all the flooding and Ruidoso In the north, With the Calf Canyon Hermits Peak, 600 people lost their homes.

They haven't repaired it yet.

It's very difficult to do that.

We have got to have better mechanisms on how we mitigate what this extreme weather produced by climate change is going to do to us.

If we don't do something, we're going to be spending all of our budget on mitigating and trying to save people, save their homes, save our roads, save our water.

>> Gwyneth: Some of the other changes to the bill have to do with enforcement.

Are the enforcement mechanisms that are still in the bill, as strong as you would like them to be?

And what happens if that enforcement can't be met?

>> Stewart: So we changed from last year where we really sort of laid out more specificity in how this would work.

But we have good mechanisms now in the environment department and energy and Minerals to look at who's stepping up, who's doing the emission reduction and what help they may need.

So in the bill, it really requires the environment department to work with all the industries that are having trouble.

Most of the industries are right now trying to lower emissions.

That includes oil and gas.

It's not like we're starting from zero.

We've all been doing this for seven years.

We've made a lot of progress.

So I believe that we've put in rulemaking, we've put in inventorying.

We've put in reporting and we've put in- we've put in both the Environmental Improvement Board and the Air Quality Control Commission so that they can set these for this work.

So I believe we've given them just as much as they need and not a bit more.

>> Gwyneth: You mentioned at the beginning that you've been working on this since the beginning of, Governor Lujan Grisham is first term.

She's leaving office.

Is this an important thing for cementing her climate legacy and your climate legacy?

>> Stewart: Absolutely.

We want the work to continue.

And that's why you put it in statute.

We now know what we're doing, why and how and who needs to do it.

And we want to put it in statute.

So it doesn't go away when she goes away.

She's been phenomenal.

I'm very proud of what she did when she first got here.

I'm proud of all of us talking about this now.

We used to not even say the words climate change, and some people don't even want us to say that now.

It's here.

The extreme weather that we've experienced, that the whole world has experienced is not going to go away unless we, as a world, lower our greenhouse gas emissions.

That's what 98% of the scientists say.

And then the other 2% are out in la la land somewhere.

But this is an important issue for everyone, everywhere.

I go.

Young people say to me, what are you doing Ms.

Stewart to fix climate change?

And they're serious.

And they write me letters from high school, from middle school.

This isn't something that we should ignore.

This is something we should continue.

We should continue to work together as a state.

We have high emissions because we have high oil and gas.

They're gonna scream at the top of their lungs.

You're running us out of the state.

They're not going anywhere until they suck every last bit of oil out of that ground.

>> Gwyneth: Senator, thank you so much for talking to us today.

>> Stewart: Thank you.

Gwyneth.

>> Nash: Thanks to Senator Steward for her time.

Among the changes in this year's Clear Horizons bills is a requirement for the Environment department to consult with potentially effected tribal governments before enacting any new policies.

Ahtza Dawn Chávez Executive Director of NM Native Vote spoke with Gwyneth about that addition.

Saying it could help proctect Tribal Sovereignty while still moving the state towards reducing emissions.

For more on why Chávez is encouraging lawmakers to pass the bill, here's Gwyneth.

>> Gwenyth: Ahtza Dawn Chávez.

Thank you, so much for talking to us.

I want to ask you, oil and gas development is crucial for some tribal nations.

But it's also a highly contentious issue in terms of environmental and health impacts.

Why is native vote supporting Clear horizons >> Chávez: NM Native vote is supporting Clear Horizons for a couple of reasons.

We've seen federally how, some of our clean air, clean water standards have been kind of whittled away under this current administration.

The Clear Horizons Act will basically codify the targets for our state so that we meet those goals, to, to deal with the climate change that we're all facing.

I'm half Navajo and half Pueblo.

On my Pueblo side, we see less water.

We see even some of our plants out in the Navajo Nation, literally burning up under the sun.

We know that we have a huge methane cloud over the Navajo Nation.

And so all of this begs for us to do what we need to, to secure that in seven generations or even the next generation that we have clean, air, land and water for us to thrive in.

And so we do know that we never want to step on tribal sovereignty and so we know that our neighbors, other tribes, nations and pueblos have the opportunity to do that as they exert their sovereign rights.

However, we want to make sure that we have a planet that will all sustain us as as the creatures that live on it.

>> Gwenyth: Yeah.

This bill requires the Environment Department to consult with potentially affected tribal governments.

Is that consultation different from how tribes are typically, engaged with on environmental policy?

>> Chávez: It really is.

You know, tribes, nations and pueblos really live in a framework that has to do with federal, state and tribal jurisdiction.

We never want to step on their sovereign rights to do as they wish for their communities.

And we needed to develop a framework.

That was different from last year.

We had some questions on whether or not this particular build would overstep into that tribal sovereign, space.

And so we were able to create a federal, state and tribal jurisdictional framework within the Clear Horizons Act so that if there are any particular lands, amongst the checkerboard tribal areas that might come into conflict in terms of who might regulate, that that area, we've been able to develop a framework that very clearly dictates that if there is that particular issue that the state and that particular tribe, nation or pueblo can enter an intra tribal mental agreement to go ahead and have a conversation about what really needs to happen, because we don't want to step on people's toes, but we do want to protect the safety of all of our other residents and our state.

>> Gwenyth: Clear horizons also allows tribal nations to voluntarily participate in carbon offset programs.

What opportunities does this create and why is the voluntary thing important?

>> Chávez: Again, we don't want to tell people what they need to do.

And these offsets are a little bit different from some of the offsets that were used to.

They really need to be tied to true and reliable and accurate offsets that are within the state.

So we're not looking at creating a market system that's not something that'll happen.

And they need to be measurable.

So there's a lot of guardrails on the way that they're proposing these offsets.

And really, after six years of trying to get this bill across the finish line, we've learned a lot from a lot of the industry folks, from a lot of the legislators here in the building, from the governor herself, and really had a lot of conversations with a lot of tribal nations.

And NM Native vote.

Put hundreds of staff hours and, tens of thousands of dollars in bringing all of the people together, whether it was University of New Mexico's, legal clinics, whether it was tribal lawyers or all of the people that, live in the communities that might be treated as tribes.

Our treatment of the state's TAS tribes, we had conversations with them meaningfully to just make sure that people understood the implications of this bill and made sure that we safeguarded sovereignty at all points.

Always with a core value of wanting to protect our air, land and water.

>> Gwenyth: And lastly, and just briefly, this bill, some critics say, is significantly weaker than it was last year.

And including in, in methane.

Why is that acceptable this year?

>> Chávez: I think this bill is a really good start in standing up to what federally is happening in our country and allowing our state to say in this area we will protect our air, land and water.

It's not the perfect bill, but it's in the right direction.

And it's with a lot of folks who have tried very hard to meet this goal so that we don't see things being pushed back, our water back.

And when we have a new governor, if it's not someone who has the same, care for our planet, that at least we have the safeguards that we will meet those targets and protect our New Mexicans from further pollution in the state.

And as a member of frontline communities and people that have been here for centuries, I want to make sure that I don't have to move somewhere else to have the same quality of life that generations before me have had.

So for us, at NM native vote.

It is very, very crucial for us to get this across.

The finish line.

We don't have any time to play.

We need the water for our people.

We need the clean air.

We need to be able to trust the land that we sit on and be able to work the land if we so choose.

And that's all we're asking for.

We want a future that's better for each and everyone in the state.

>> Nash: Thanks to Gwyneth and to Ahtza Dawn Chávez for that conversation.

Let's stay on the environment as we wrap up the show.

Jerry Redfearn of the nonprofit news outlet Capital and Maine, one of our partners, reports on oil and gas like no other journalist in the state.

We've been delighted to have him on board this session to bring you some of his unique perspective and reporting, including his interview last week with the head of the State Oil and Gas Association.

You can find that on our YouTube page if you missed it.

Jerry is back this week with Executive Producer Jeff Proctor to talk about a bill that is very much oil and gas related, though you probably never know it if not for Jerry, along with some grim projections from the Legislative Finance Committee and of all things, the weather.

Here's that conversation.

>> Jeff: Jerry.

Welcome back.

I don't think I'm going to enjoy this as much as I did your interview with Missy Courier last week, but let's try to get after it a little bit anyway.

I want to start with a bill your watching that would pay for some seismology equipment.

For the record, that's earthquake related stuff for a New Mexico Tech university.

What's in the bill?

Why does the school need the money?

And why are we talking about this in the context of oil and gas?

>> Jerry: Right so it's actually a pretty straightforward idea.

The seismology, there's a seismology department at New Mexico Tech.

They kind of monitor all of the size of electrical activity in the state.

What they're hoping to do is increase the number of seismological listening stations around the state from 17 to 43.

And if you read the bill, you might not think, well, what does this actually have to do with oil and gas?

But if you read in the fiscal impact report, the, you know, the accountants actually point out, well, this is to help the oil conservation division and why is it helping the oil conservation division?

Because a lot of the seismology that's happening in the state, that's increasing in the state, that's happening down on the very southern border around Carlsbad and south of there along the Texas border.

And it's because of what's called re injection.

So, you know, I tend to think of oil wells as actually like water wells with some oil mixed in.

So what normally happens in the Permian, you get about five barrels of this produced water.

Very toxic, salty, produced water for every barrel of oil.

There's not a lot you can do with it.

That's a whole nother story in itself.

So what operators tend to do is re inject that water back underground, usually in formations below oil and gas formations.

So this is where it gets kind of complicated again.

You're injecting tons and tons and tons of water back underground.

That causes little fractures.

That causes these micro earthquakes all over the place.

What they're hoping to do is be able to study these micro earthquakes so they can figure out when underground aquifers that they're creating, essentially are getting overloaded and might create bigger earthquakes, which has obviously all sorts of bigger implications.

>> Jeff: Gotcha, sounds like the school does need the money.

And this is a good lesson to always read the fiscal impact report.

That sounds like something that we'll be interested in watching as it goes forward.

Let's move on to some proposed changes to the Oil and Gas Conservation Tax Act, whose title should be self-explanatory enough.

I understand Representative Matthew McQueen had, an interesting question that he posed while this bill was being debated the other day.

What was he on about?

>> Jerry: Right, so the big argument, I guess you could say with this is that the conservation tax has in large part gone to fund the reclamation Fund.

But it doesn't really.

It only spends about 20% of that tax goes into the fund, and the rest of it gets rolled into the general funds for the state.

Right?

And the argument has been particularly from the right, particularly from oil and gas companies.

We're rolling too much of this over into the general fund.

This is a reclamation fund.

This is a conservation tax that should all be going toward reclamation.

The question that McQueen had was really is that the history of this and he didn't know.

And the apparently going back to the 1970s, the original wording and thinking about it isn't entirely clear, but it is an interesting question to ask.

I think the really big part of this, though, is why do we have a reclamation fund?

>> Jeff: It's sounded like a good faith question at least that he was asking genuinely interested in the answer.

>> Jerry: Yeah.

Why was this set up originally in the first place.

Was it for reclamation.

Was it to, you know, have some money and go in different directions or what.

So good questions there I think.

>> Jeff: Also connected to that bill was a legislative finance committee analysis that had some pretty eye popping numbers in it.

What can you tell me about those?

>> Jerry: Yeah, that report came out last year.

And the legislative finance Committee put to it's a really interesting report if you like to read about oil and gas.

But it's saying that in the future the state's likely going to be on the hook for somewhere between 700 million and 1.6 billion in cleanup costs around abandoned oil and gas wells and infrastructure in the state of New Mexico.

And that's obviously a lot of money.

A lot of that money would be coming from the Reclamation Fund, which at the time that the report was released had all of $77 million in it.

So another couple of backing facts to put those numbers into perspective, there are 700 plus abandoned wells that the state recognizes in the state at this point.

I think there's probably quite a bit more than that.

And the last time I asked the oil conservation division, they were saying it costs right around $165,000 per well to plug a well remediated sort of try to put it back in its semi-natural state.

So you can do the math there.

We're talking huge amounts of money.

And that's kind of what has everybody concerned.

>> Jeff: It sounds like 1.6 billion might even be a little light as we look ahead.

We've got just a little bit of time left, and I can't believe I'm about to ask you this question, but I want to talk about the weather.

People who are alive in New Mexico and across the US understand that we've just been through a cold snap.

What gives?

Why?

>> Jerry: Well, because of climate warming.

And it might seem incongruous that we talk about climate warming and having a cold snap.

But, you know, where did the cold snap come from?

It came from the North Pole, literally.

And what's been going on up there is this year we are seeing the lowest ice pack at the North Pole that's ever been recorded.

And what does that mean?

That means you have more ocean facing toward the atmosphere.

Right.

And the ocean is warmer than the atmosphere.

So it's an energy transfer.

And this is really what happens a lot with climate warming.

It's not the warming so much as this energy transfer that then bumps storms into bigger storms.

And we've seen that in the past.

And that's how things get changed.

So you have a storm that starts in the pole.

It gets this extra energy added to it.

You have extra warm air that pushes up from the Atlantic, and it sort of knocks that huge cap of cold air off the North Pole that then swirls around North America and gives us what we just saw.

>> Jeff: Thank you for explaining that.

I appreciate it, and we will look forward to your further oil and gas reporting as the session proceeds.

Thanks, Jerry.

>> Jerry: Thank you.

Jeff.

>> Nash: A big thanks to Jerry Redfern for making sure that you don't lose sight of the oil and gas industry and what it's up to this session and everyone else who contributed to the show.

We will be back in Santa Fe again next week for another legislative dive, and we will shift away from the Roundhouse for a couple other things that we got cookin' that we think you'll appreciate.

For New Mexico PBS, I'm Nash Jones.

Until then, stay focused.

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