This article was published by Source New Mexico. To read more visit sourcenm.org.
Private attorneys representing people who otherwise can’t afford a legal defense in federal courts in New Mexico are working for free because the public program that pays them — and private federal defenders across the country — ran out of money at the start of July.
In interviews this week, private defense attorneys told Source NM the lack of pay is especially urgent in Southern New Mexico because of the massive volume of cases being prosecuted by the U.S. government as part of President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda, specifically the newly created military buffer zone along New Mexico’s border with Mexico.
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The funding crisis has raised concerns in the federal judiciary about providing adequate and legally mandated representation to defendants who can’t afford an attorney — approximately 90% of all defendants in federal court, according to a United States Courts news release on Tuesday. Federal defender organizations handle approximately 60% of such cases, while private attorneys who agree and are qualified to serve on a state-level Criminal Justice Act panel take on the rest.
Funding for those panels, however, ran out July 3, after Congress in March froze all judicial branch funding at last year’s levels as part of its continuing budget resolution.
In New Mexico, some private defense attorneys have stopped taking cases until funding resumes, Ryan Villa, the CJA panel representative for the District of New Mexico, told Source NM.
If more lawyers start turning down CJA appointments, then it is unclear who will represent those people, Villa said.
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This places at risk the “fundamental right” of a person facing criminal charges “to effective counsel regardless of the defendant’s economic status,” Judge Amy St. Eve, chair of the national Judicial Conference’s Budget Committee, said in a statement.
St. Eve’s statement also notes that the attorneys won’t be paid until Oct. 1 “for the work they have done and for the work that we continue to ask them to do, unless the Judiciary receives supplemental funding from Congress before then.”
Cori Harbour, an El Paso-based attorney who also works as a private federal defender on the New Mexico CJA panel’s Las Cruces division, told Source she had to stop taking on new cases in the Western District of Texas, and has pivoted to find other kinds of legal work in order to pay her staff. She said next week, she will have to decide whether to continue taking cases in the District of New Mexico.
There are 73 lawyers on the Albuquerque division of the CJA panel in New Mexico, and 29 private attorneys who are on the CJA panel’s Las Cruces division, according to court records. There are approximately 12,000 CJA attorneys across the country, Villa said.
In addition to their own billing, defense attorneys also have to pay out experts such as paralegals, investigators, language interpreters, social workers, mitigation specialists and forensic psychologists.
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Such experts have asked attorneys to delay their cases because they can’t sustain working trials without being paid, Villa said. Harbour confirmed her investigator has had to turn down unpaid CJA jobs and instead look for other income sources.
Moreover, the Las Cruces court has seen a surge of defendants being charged under the federal government’s new criminal trespassing laws for entering the so-called National Defense Area on New Mexico’s border.
Those additional military trespass charges come on top of the unlawful entry charges brought against migrants before the buffer zone existed, Harbour said, creating more work for the defense.
“The case numbers have been astronomical because they are prosecuting everything,” Harbour said. “There’s just no way for us to handle the number of cases that are coming in, and then to expect us to do it now without compensation is just a lot.”
Harbour said she has 71 open CJA cases, her largest caseload ever in her 20-year career. Almost all of her cases require an interpreter, usually for Spanish, she said, which is yet another expense no longer covered.
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Federal public defenders can’t step in because they are already understaffed and overworked, and have been under a hiring freeze for 17 of the past 24 months because of tight budgets from Congress, according to the judiciary’s news release.
Margaret Katze, federal public defender for the District of New Mexico, told Source NM it is “more than unfair” to expect attorneys to work for almost three months without getting paid for that work.
“It is a terribly difficult situation,” Katze said in an emailed statement. “The federal defense function, one that is critical to the justice system, must be appropriately funded. People do this work because they believe that it is important that people accused of crimes in federal court, who cannot afford to hire attorneys, deserve equally strong representation.”
NM FAST (New Mexico Federal and State Technology) is now accepting applications for a free space-sector accelerator cohort designed to help New Mexico-based technology companies compete for federal funding through the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs. The cohort targets founders and researchers pursuing grants from NASA, Space Force and related federal agencies, with programming set to launch July 21.
The cohort will admit six to 10 New Mexico companies and run for 10 to 12 weeks, meeting in weekly sessions of approximately one and a half to two hours. Programming covers the full arc of federal commercialization strategy, including space-sector SBIR/STTR opportunities and federal funding pathways, proposal development for technical narratives and commercialization components, federal procurement positioning and agency discovery, capital strategy and follow-on funding options, and transition planning from Phase I to Phase II awards. Participants also receive targeted one-on-one advisory support throughout the program. The cohort is offered at no cost to accepted companies.
The program is open to companies at both the pre-award and early-award stages. The majority of cohort seats are designed for Phase 0 companies preparing to submit Phase I SBIR/STTR applications to NASA or Space Force. A limited number of seats are available for Phase I awardees working toward Phase II readiness and Phase III transition planning.
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“New Mexico has a deep base of research and a growing pipeline of founders ready to translate that work into companies that can compete for federal R&D dollars,” said Carlos Murguia, director of the Technology and Innovation Gateway at Arrowhead Center. “This cohort focuses specifically on the space sector, pairing New Mexico companies with Larta’s expertise in SBIR and STTR commercialization to give founders a clear, structured path from early-stage research to federal award.”
Larta Institute, NM FAST’s commercialization partner for this program, will lead the full design and delivery of the accelerator curriculum. Larta has supported startups that have collectively raised more than $23.7 billion since 1993 and brings that track record to founders working in New Mexico’s growing aerospace and space technology sector.
The cohort aligns with the aerospace priority sector named in the New Mexico Entrepreneurship Programmatic Support Grant and is relevant to companies working at the intersection of advanced computing, bioscience and advanced energy applications in space-related contexts.
NM FAST is administered by Arrowhead Center at New Mexico State University and operates statewide, serving founders in Las Cruces, Albuquerque, Los Alamos and rural communities across New Mexico. Over more than a decade of programming, NM FAST has supported more than 470 New Mexico startups and helped companies secure nearly $28 million in federal SBIR awards. Targeted outreach is directed to rural, women, veteran and minority entrepreneurs.
The program is sponsored by the New Mexico Economic Development Department’s Technology and Innovation Office through the New Mexico Entrepreneurship Programmatic Support Grant, which supports continued statewide programming for SBIR/STTR-eligible companies in the four priority sectors.
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Applications are open now and will be accepted through July 14, 2026. Interested companies can apply at forms.gle/CqSwEL7LahqB5pGu9. Space is limited, and selected companies will be notified before the program launch.
SANTA FE, N.M. – Santa Fe County and Edgewood approved a new agreement and ordinance that secures ongoing fire and EMS services for Edgewood residents.
According to a joint announcement from the Town of Edgewood and Santa Fe County on June 19, the two governments negotiated and adopted a new Joint Powers Agreement and ordinance to keep the Santa Fe County Fire Department serving the town.
County and town representatives drafted the agreement together. The town adopted the ordinance unanimously at a special meeting on June 16, putting an end to weeks of uncertainty.
Santa Fe County District 3 Commissioner Camilla Bustamante said, “I believe we are all relieved to know that the people of Edgewood will continue to have the fire and EMS services necessary to protect their homes, their families, and their community. This community deserves nothing less.”
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The announcement said the ordinance takes effect five days after final publication. The statement also said no further action or approval is needed to guarantee continued fire suppression, fire prevention, and EMS services for Edgewood residents.
Both governments noted the agreement will continue indefinitely unless either side ends it with five years’ notice.
