WASHINGTON — Everything is bigger in Texas, but could the state get even larger? Texas lawmakers have begun exploring whether to annex a part of neighboring New Mexico, where many residents say they would prefer to join the Lone Star State. However, key officials in New Mexico are dismissing the idea.

State Rep. Carl Tepper, R-Lubbock, told Spectrum News that Texans have a lot in common culturally with those from the eastern portion of New Mexico. He said hospitals, companies and universities in his community have many people from there. 

“These are oil producers. They’re cattlemen. They’re farmers. They are fiercely independent. They don’t rely on government. Texas is a smaller government state, less regulations, less taxes,” Tepper said. “They feel much closer to us than they do the government in Santa Fe.” 

And that is why he believes the Texas Legislature should explore annexing a part of New Mexico.

Texas House Speaker Dustin Burrows, R-Lubbock, directed the governmental oversight committee to study the constitutional and economic implications of adding a couple of counties in southeast New Mexico to Texas. The Republican state lawmakers in Lea and Roosevelt counties in New Mexico, just west of Lubbock, have expressed an interest in leaving their state.

In a statement to Spectrum News, Burrows said, in part, “This conversation is ultimately about culture, opportunity, and the right to choose a path that reflects the shared values of the Permian and Delaware basins.”

Tepper agreed. He said it would be “historic” if the Republican-led Legislature could pull it off.

“There’s a vast amount of conservative voters out there. People who are conservative economically, with their faith, and are very frustrated with the core urban high-density areas and the voters there ruling over vast portions of the geographic areas of these states,” Tepper said.

“If we could find a way to essentially liberate these New Mexico counties into Texas, I think we would also be cutting a path for other counties that are frustrated with their centralized governments being overbearing in other states and bringing them over to more conservative states,” Tepper continued.

New Mexico Democrats are dismissing the idea. A spokesperson for the governor reportedly called it “not serious,” and the New Mexico House speaker said on social media, “Dude, over my dead body, man. No way, no way.”

Legal experts said under the U.S. Constitution, not only would New Mexico and Texas need to agree on annexation, but Congress as well.

“It’s very, very hard to imagine winning that trifecta,” said Sanford Levinson, a professor at the University of Texas School of Law. “It’s hard for me to imagine that New Mexico would be delighted to lose this population, even if the Democrats who run the state probably have no love lost for the Republicans who want to leave.” 

Levinson said one big reason the idea is a non-starter is that because of the population change under the new borders, New Mexico would likely lose a congressional seat and Texas would gain one.

He added that conservatives in Oregon and Illinois are also looking at leaving their states.

“The polarization that we talk so much about is found as much within states as among states and the United States, that if you look at practically any state in the union, you find these sharp divisions,” Levinson said. 

And despite the sharp divisions, new state lines are hard to draw.