New Mexico

NM Legislature Recap Jan. 29: Blizzards of of snow and white coats • Source New Mexico

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12 months ago

January 29, 2025

NM Legislature Recap Jan. 29: Blizzards of of snow and white coats • Source New Mexico

Snow blanketed the New Mexico Capitol on Wednesday, but inside was a sea of cherry red and silver honoring the University of New Mexico, which also released a scrum of white-coated medical school physicians to roam the halls.

The state Senate unanimously confirmed one of its former colleagues, Greg Nibert, to a six-year term on the utility regulating body, the Public Regulation Committee. Nibert, a former legislator in both chambers, was ousted in the June primary by Sen. Pat Boone (R-Elida). Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham appointed Nibert earlier this month, selecting him from a pool of 32 applicants, according to a press release from the PRC.

A bundle of behavioral health bills will face further consideration after a three-hour Senate Health and Public Affairs committee meeting. While members approved Senate Bill 1, which creates a $1 billion fund for behavioral health 10-0, the committee ran out of time to consider related bills, and wanted to further evaluate and potentially amend them.

The committee will evaluate Senate Bill 2, an appropriations bill for an additional $140 million for seven agencies and grants for communities, and Senate Bill 3, which directs the courts to develop behavioral health regions, coordinate meetings and develop regional plans on Monday.

The Senate Education Committee passed three bills through in the morning and bumped another three to Friday after the committee ran out of time before lawmakers were expected on the Senate Floor at 11 a.m. The bills they advanced:

Senate Bill 60 to establish a high school water management pilot project from Sen. Michael Padilla (D-Albuquerque) passed unanimously and heads to the Senate Conservation committee.
Sen. Pat Woods (R-Clovis) sponsored Senate Bill 8, which puts aside $5 million for a school loan repayment program for veterinarians, passed 9-0, and now heads to Senate Judiciary.
Senate Bill 11, from Sen. Crystal Brantley (R-Elephant Butte) requests districts adopt policies to store cell phones during the school day and offers $10 million in funding for reimbursement. It passed 7-2 and heads to Senate Finance.

Lawmakers rolled Senate Bill 10, the Anti-Hazing Act proposed by Sen. Harold Pope (D-Albuquerque), to Friday’s Senate Education Committee meeting, following a request from committee members to consider amending the bill to take out provisions related to primary school students. Another anti-hazing bill is in the works, as well.

The committee also pushed to Friday: Senate Bill 13, the State-Tribal Education Compact Act, proposed by Sen. Benny Shendo (D-Jemez Pueblo) (read more about that bill here) and

Senate Bill 19 from Sen. Jeff Steinborn (D-Las Cruces), which would require the Higher Education Department to develop a 10-hour training for new university regents and those who have more than one year left in their term as of June 20, 2025.

To keep track of all these bills and the ones below, make sure to check Source New Mexico’s bill tracker. And please reach out to us if there’s any information you’d like us to include on it: [email protected]

Bill watch

The Senate Judiciary Committee heard three public safety bills on Wednesday afternoon: Senate Bill 18, which would create the crime of SWATing, Senate Bill 32, which would raise the penalty for possessing a stolen firearm, and Senate Bill 70, which would add 11 new crimes to the definition of racketeering.

The committee did not vote on any of the bills because Chair Sen. Joseph Cervantes (D-Las Cruces) said any crime-related legislation that passes through his committee will likely be “rolled” together into an omnibus bill.

Water protection bills will be heard by the Senate Conservation Committee at 8:30 a.m. Thursday. Read more about them here.

The House Consumer and Public Affairs Committee will hear another batch of public safety bills Thursday afternoon, including elevated sentences for shooting threats, possessions of weapon conversion devices, penalties for vehicle thefts and use of juvenile records in firearm background checks. Lawmakers will also discuss the Artificial Intelligence Act.

Word on the street is there will be a special address to both chambers tomorrow. We’ll keep you posted.

Source NM reporters Patrick Lohmann and Austin Fisher contributed to the writing and reporting of this article.

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New Mexico

New award honors two New Mexico women who dedicated lives to agriculture

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3 hours ago

January 11, 2026

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New award honors two New Mexico women who dedicated lives to agriculture

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New Mexico

Actor Timothy Busfield accused of child sex abuse in New Mexico

Published

15 hours ago

January 10, 2026

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Actor Timothy Busfield accused of child sex abuse in New Mexico

Authorities in New Mexico issued an arrest warrant Friday for director and Emmy Award-winning actor Timothy Busfield to face a child sex abuse charge.

An investigator with the Albuquerque Police Department filed a criminal complaint in support of the charge, which says a child reported that Busfield touched him inappropriately. The acts allegedly occurred on the set of “The Cleaning Lady,” a TV series Busfield directed and acted in.

The child said the first incident happened when he was 7 years old and Busfield touched him three or four times. Busfield allegedly touched him five or six times on another occasion when he was 8.

The child’s mother reported to Child Protective Services that the abuse occurred between November 2022 and spring 2024, the complaint said.

Busfield’s attorney and agent did not immediately respond to email messages seeking comment late Friday.

The arrest warrant, which was signed by a judge, said the charge is for two counts of criminal sexual contact of a minor.

According to the complaint, the child, which it identifies only by his initials, has been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety. A social worker documented him saying he has had nightmares about Busfield touching him and woken up scared.

The child was reportedly afraid to tell anyone because Busfield was the director and he feared he would get mad at him.

The investigation began in November 2024, when the investigator responded to a call from a doctor at the University of New Mexico Hospital. The child’s parents had gone there at the recommendation of a law firm, the complaint said.

“The Cleaning Lady” aired for four seasons on Fox, ending in 2025. It starred Elodie Yung as a Cambodian doctor who comes to the United States to get medical treatment for her son, witnesses a mob killing and ends up becoming a cleaner for organized crime.

The show was produced by Warner Bros., which according to the complaint conducted its own investigation into the abuse allegations but was unable to corroborate them.

Busfield is known for appearances in “The West Wing,” “Field of Dreams” and “Thirtysomething,” the latter of which won him an Emmy for outstanding supporting actor in a drama series in 1991.

He is married to actor Melissa Gilbert; there was no immediate response to an email sent to her publicist.

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New Mexico

Timothy Busfield Charged With Child Sex Abuse On ‘The Cleaning Lady’s New Mexico Set; WBTV Will “Cooperate With Law Enforcement”

Published

1 day ago

January 10, 2026

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Timothy Busfield Charged With Child Sex Abuse On ‘The Cleaning Lady’s New Mexico Set; WBTV Will “Cooperate With Law Enforcement”

A 10-year-old New Mexico boy says Timothy Busfield “touched his ‘poop’ and ‘pee’ area” during production on The Cleaning Lady, an Albuquerque District Attorney–approved arrest warrant issued today says.

“In my training and experience, pedophiles often infiltrate families under a trusted role, like Timothy, who, as a producer, exploited the hectic film sets to tickle and touch SL on his penis and buttocks, masking it as play,” the warrant from Albuquerque Police Officer Marvin Brown asserts. “He would invite the family to off-set gatherings, with his wife buying Christmas gifts to foster closeness, making SL feel special and dependent—classic grooming to erode boundaries, isolate the victim, and silence suspicions by blending abuse into normalcy.”

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Filled with accounts from two brothers of their alleged repeated experiences with the Thirtysomething alum, who was a director on the now shuttered Élodie Yung-led Fox drama from Warner Bros TV, the document charges Busfield with two counts of criminal sexual contact with a minor and child abuse. It is unclear at this point if the Emmy winner has been arrested and booked by Albuquerque Police Department.

If found guilty of the charges, Busfield could face a minimum of three years behind bars.

In fact, the 68-year-old, who was accused but never charged in two previous sexual assault allegations in 1994 and 2012, could be looking at a lot longer sentence in the Land of Enchantment.

Under New Mexico statutes, prison time in sex crimes against minors leans heavily on context and circumstances in the degrees of punishment they hand out. That time and felony class can go up substantially if the crime involves children under 13 years of age — as it allegedly does here.

Named as “SL” and “VL” in the warrant, the two 2014-born boys appeared on The Cleaning Lady over multiple seasons before being let go for having aged out of the role, I hear. However, in a Nov. 3, 2025 phone interview with Busfield in the warrant, The West Wing vet told investigating Officer Brown that he “the lead actress, Elodie Young” informed him over a year ago that “the mother of SL and VL (sic) that she wanted revenge, and I’m going to get my revenge on Tim Busfield for not bringing her kids back for the final season.”

Courtesy of Fox

In interviews conducted with SL and VL on Halloween last year by a “forensic child interviewer,” and observed by Officer Brown, today’s arrest warrant says that the former told them the alleged abuse by Busfield started when he was 7 years old and on The Cleaning Lady.

“SL said that Tim touched him three to four times on his ‘poop’ and ‘pee’ area over his clothing,” the 12-page arrest warrant states of what is cited as a second incident with Busfield, very similar to a previous incident. “SL said he was very afraid of Tim and was relieved when he was off set. SL said he was afraid to tell anyone because Tim was the director, and he feared Tim would get mad at him. SL did advise that Tim touched him while he was only on set filming in Albuquerque.”

SL now suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety, the warrant says. SL disclosing having nightmares about the director touching him and waking up scared,” the document adds.

It goes on: “VL explained that Mr. Tim started touching them for the first two years, and he did not want to say anything, because he did not want to be mean to him. Therefore, VL did not say anything. VL said Mr. Tim would start touching him with his hands about his body while they were filming in the ‘house’. VL advised that it was about his body, but did not disclose that he was touched on his buttocks or penis area. VL said he did not like being touched, but did not say anything because he did not want to get in trouble.”

The matter actually first came to the cops’ attention in late 2024 when a doctor from University of New Mexico Hospital contacted the Albuquerque Police Department in regards to a “sexual abuse investigation.”

Noting that the boys’ father had been advised to go to the hospital by a local law firm, today’s warrant details: Officer Osborn talked with both VL and SL, who did not disclose any sexual contact at this time. However, both boys advised that Timothy Busfield, whom they referred to as ‘Uncle Tim’, would tickle them on the stomach and legs. Neither boy cared for the tickling. Officer Osborn contacted Detective Michael Brown with the Crimes Against Children Unit and determined that the case did not meet their acceptance criteria at this time.”

The matter came back to the police’s attention and became a much greater priority after the boys’ mother “advised that on 09/02/2025, SL reported to his counselor that Timothy Busfield touched his penis and bottom.”

In that same telephone conversation with Busfield in the weeks before Thanksgiving last year, the NYC-based filmmaker also dropped to Officer Brown that producers Warner Bros TV had conducted its own probe into allegations against him after SAG-AFTRA received an anonymous complaint in early 2025 of an incident on The Cleaning Lady set in December 2024. After writing up a search warrant for WB (which today’s warrant seems to mistakenly say occurred on “10/03/2025”) and several correspondences with WB attorney Richard Wessling at law firm Proskauer, Officer Brown on NYE last year got his hands on the March 31, 2025 external report put together by the LA office of Solomon Law.

Specifically the report, which saw Busfield suspended during the probe, looked into claims from the hotline caller that there was evidence of Busfield “tickling and caressing the head and body of minor boys” while working on the Albuquerque-filmed Cleaning Lady. Upon his own reading of the document, Officer Brown says in Friday’s warrant that Solomon investigator “Christina McGovern was not able to talk with anyone who would support evidence that Timothy Busfield engaged in this behavior.”

Working from what now seems to be limited accusations, the WBTV investigation viewed Busfield as “exonerated,” sources tell me.

In a statement to Deadline tonight, the Channing Dungey-led WBTV said: “The health and safety of our cast and crew is always our top priority, especially the safety of minors on our productions. We take all allegations of misconduct very seriously and have systems in place to promptly and thoroughly investigate, and when needed, take appropriate action. We are aware of the current charges against Mr. Busfield and have been and will continue to cooperate with law enforcement.”

As well as speaking to the boys’ mother and father (who seem to have instigated and then ceased a civil suit on this), plus some Cleaning Lady production assistants and Make-up and Hair department staffers, today’s warrant also details a brief back-and-forth between Officer Brown and the series star Yung, who was a producer too.

“On 11/5/2025, I contacted Elodie Yung to set up an interview. Elodie agreed to meet with me at the Northwest Substation on 11/7/2025,” Officer Brown notes in his fairly comprehensive affidavit that e Albuquerque Assistant DA Savannah Brandenburg-Koch signed off on today. “I did initially advise Elodie that Tim Busfield gave me her name and said that she may have information about this case. On 11/06/2025, Elodie left me a voicemail declining to speak with me and said that she does not want to be involved with the investigation and that she would not have any information that could assist in this case.”

Busfield’s agents at Innovative Artists did not respond late Friday to Deadline’s request for comment on the arrest warrant and the charges against their client.

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