New Mexico
Southeast New Mexico lawmakers claim victory, frustration after 2024 legislative session

Southeast New Mexico Republicans said they defended the oil and gas industry, gun rights and business owners from Democrat-led initiatives during the 2024 Legislative Session that concluded Feb. 15.
Several bills seeking to increase restrictions on firearms, regulations on industry and drive up costs for consumers were blocked or “watered down,” GOP leaders said, while others succeeded to the chagrin of the minority party.
This year’s session was focused on the budget, running for 30 days, compared to 60-day session convening on odd-numbered years.
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But that didn’t stop Democrats who control both the House and Senate and the Governor’s Office from pushing bills Republicans viewed as limiting constitutional rights or stymieing the economy via restrictions on New Mexico’s nation-leading fossil fuel industry.
Oil and gas bills mostly blocked after early-session momentum
Revenue from the fossil fuel industry accounted for about 54 percent of New Mexico’s revenue for the next fiscal year, contended Rep. Cathrynn Brown (R-54) of Carlsbad, displaying the industry’s import to the state.
House Bill 133 was intended to reform the Oil and Gas Act by adding requirements like setbacks between oil and gas facilities and residences or bodies of water. It also increased bonding requirements that operators pay to fund clean up of abandoned wells, and would have codified into law gas capture requirements enacted by the state’s Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department.
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Despite the setbacks being removed, and the bonding requirements tiered to reduce costs for smaller oil companies, the bill stalled on the House Floor without a vote.
Brown said this indicated more lawmakers, including Democrat leadership, were beginning to see the essential role oil and gas plays in New Mexico.
“The more you tax this industry, the less production you get and the less revenue for the state of New Mexico,” she said. “I think we started the session with the news that the oil and gas industry provided 54 percent of state revenue. That to me was a reality check to everyone about how important this industry is to the state.”
More: 2024 Legislative session wrap up: Here’s how energy and environment bills fared
Rep. Jim Townsend (R-54) of Artesia said in a likely first, major oil companies appeared to support the amended bill, while smaller, independent producers remained opposed.
“The smaller producers were not in favor of that,” Townsend said. “When you have a major lobbyist up there wanting something, you know it’s good for their shareholders. But I think, all in all, everybody did alright.”
House Bill 48, which would have raised royalty rates operators pay on the value of oil and gas also stalled − this time in the Senate Finance Committee despite passing the House.
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“Most of the state land is already leased,” Brown said. “It was really a window dressing bill. It would not have produced much new revenue.”
Sen. Ron Griggs (R-34) touted his sponsored Senate Bill 64, which was added to the tax package passed by the legislature and awaiting approval from Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham. He said this language allowed some exceptions for small oil and gas operators from paying severance taxes on low-producing or “stripper wells” while also devising a program to help those operators come into compliance with state regulations.
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“It’s probably the first oil and gas bill in the last 20 or 30 years that was favorable to the industry,” Griggs said. “But it’s also favorable to New Mexico because it allows them (oil companies) to continue producing oil and gas.”
Griggs, Brown and Townsend, like many members of their party, were heavily opposed to House Bill 41, known as the “Clean Transportation Fuels Standard” which passed the House and Senate and was awaiting Lujan Grisham’s signature as of Thursday.
HB 41 called on the state to begin a rulemaking targeting reductions in carbon pollution from cars and trucks, an action many viewed as favoring electric vehicles and driving up costs for energy companies.
More: Short term state revenue loss for Hobbs passes committee, bills for Carlsbad stalled
The bill would only serve to increase the price New Mexico drivers pay at the pump, Townsend said. Brown estimated the bill would increase gasoline prices by up to 50 cents per gallon.
“Hopefully the governor comes to her senses and realizes that’s a really partisan bill,” Townsend said. “That was a Democrat bill, and I think they’re going to pay for it.”
Democrats push gun reforms that infringe ‘constitutional rights,’ GOP says
Firearms were also a lead topic during the session in the wake of a Lujan Grisham executive order in September that banned open or concealed carry in Albuquerque and the surrounding area amid mounting gun violence.
More: Gov. Lujan Grisham wants New Mexico to spend big. Should oil and gas foot the bill?
The order was blocked by a federal judge days later, but Democrats signaled they remained set on adding restrictions on gun to address the state’s crime problems.
Two bills made it through the legislature this year: one that imposed a seven-day waiting period for gun sales after a background check, and another banning firearm possession at polling places.
Griggs said he expected a strong push for new gun laws from the other side of the aisle, but argued the Democratic Party’s approach would not impact criminals but law-abiding gun owners.
“The right to carry is constitutional,” he said. “All you do with this legislation is hurt the law-abiding guys. The bad guys will get them (guns). They’ll get whatever kinds of guns they can get a hold of.”
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Townsend also challenged the recently-passed gun legislation as failing to address crime, contending lawmakers should have instead advanced multiple proposed bills this year to increase penalties for trafficking drugs like fentanyl allowing them to be accessed by children.
He questioned if New Mexico had ever had any gun-related incident at polling places.
“Why didn’t we do anything about fentanyl?” Townsend said. “There were a lot of things we could have done for crime in Albuquerque. It was unfortunate that we wasted our time on silly stuff.”
More: Too far or not far enough? Industry, environmentalist unite to opposed oil and gas reforms
Brown said the forefathers who drafted the U.S. Constitution never envisioned waiting periods when adding the Second Amendment, arguing such limits could affect the ability of women to defend themselves from domestic violence.
“We already have instant federal background checks. If it comes back to proceed, that person should be able to buy that firearm,” Brown said. “No person should have to wait seven days to defend themselves.”
GOP claims victory in blocking paid family medical leave
The minority party was successful in preventing Senate Bill 3, the Paid Family Medical Leave Act which would have created a state-run program to give workers up to 12 weeks off with no interruption in pay to address medical issues like doctor visits for family members.
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SB 3 would have created a fund for the program, requiring employers and employees to pay in.
The GOP argued this would unfairly burden businesses in New Mexico, and it was voted down on the House Floor after hours of debate.
Brown, who voted against SB 3, said it would take more money out New Mexicans’ pockets for a program she said not everyone would use.
“It would take money out of employees paychecks,” Brown said. “People don’t want to loose more of their paycheck. It’s paying into something most people wouldn’t use.”
Griggs said the bill needed to go through the Senate or House judiciary committees to fine tune its language to address multiple “holes” the bill had when introduced to lawmakers. This included language that allowed workers to use the program for people they “had an affinity for,” Griggs said, among several examples of language he said was too broad.
“I’m not sure why we would want to subject businesses to that,” Griggs said. “There’s a lot of open-ended things in that bill I hope they will address in the interim. It’s coming back.”
Adrian Hedden can be reached at 575-628-5516, achedden@currentargus.com or @AdrianHedden on the social media platform X.

New Mexico
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New Mexico
Carlsbad, New Mexico: Landspout Tornado On Ground In Eddy County – Video

Tornado (Representative Image)
Photo : iStock
One of the tornadoes was spotted north of Carlsbad near the McNew/Avalon area, according to a photo shared by a user on X (formerly Twitter). The twister can be seen touching down in open terrain.
Another user who shared a picture of a landspout tornado on X wrote, “It’s a Landspout party in Carlsbad right now. WOW.”
A Severe Thunderstorm Warning remains in effect for Carlsbad and La Huerta, New Mexico, until 4:00 PM MDT, as per National Weather Service (NWS).
Winds could reach up to 60 mph, and quarter-sized hail is possible. Over 14,000 residents, four schools, and one hospital are within the impacted area.
A Severe Thunderstorm Watch has been issued until 11:00 PM CDT for some parts of Texas and New Mexico.
This is a developing story.
New Mexico
Oil and gas have boomed in New Mexico. Its schools are contending with pollution’s effects

COUNSELOR, N.M. (AP) — On a Tuesday in March, Billton Werito drove his son Amari toward his house in Counselor, New Mexico, navigating the bumpy dirt road that winds through a maze of natural gas pipelines, wellheads and water tanks. Amari should have been in school, but a bout of nausea and a dull headache kept him from class.
“It happens a lot,” Amari explained from the backseat, glancing up from his Nintendo Switch. The symptoms usually show up when the sixth grader smells an odor of “rotten egg with propane” that rises from nearby natural gas wells and wafts over Lybrook Elementary School, where he and some 70 other Navajo students attend class. His little brother often misses school for the same reason.
“They just keep getting sick,” Amari’s father, Billton, said. “I have to take them out of class because of the headaches. Especially the younger one, he’s been throwing up and won’t eat.” The symptoms are putting the kids at risk of falling further behind in school.
Lybrook sits in the heart of New Mexico’s San Juan Basin, a major oil and gas deposit that, along with the Permian Basin in the state’s southeast, is supplying natural gas that meets much of the nation’s electricity demand.
The gas pulled from tens of thousands of wells in New Mexico has reaped huge benefits for the entire country. Natural gas has become a go-to fuel for power plants from coast to coast, sometimes replacing dirtier coal-fired plants and, by extension, improving air quality. Locally, oil and gas companies employ thousands of workers, often in areas with few other opportunities, all while boosting the state’s budget with billions in royalty payments.
But those benefits may come at a cost for thousands of students in New Mexico whose schools sit near oil and gas pipelines, wellheads and flare stacks. An Associated Press analysis of state and federal data found 694 oil and gas wells with new or active permits within a mile of a school in the state. This means around 29,500 students in 74 schools and preschools potentially face exposure to noxious emissions, since extraction from the ground can release unhealthy fumes.
A measurable effect on students
At Lybrook, where Amari just finished sixth grade, fewer than 6% of students are proficient at math, and only a fifth meet state standards for science and reading proficiency.
Other factors could help explain students’ poor achievement. Poverty rates are higher in some areas with high levels of gas development, and students at rural schools overall tend to face challenges that can adversely affect academic performance. AP’s analysis found two-thirds of the schools within a mile of an oil or gas well are low-income, and the population is around 24% Native American and 45% Hispanic.
But research has found student learning is directly harmed by air pollution from fossil fuels — even when socioeconomic factors are taken into account.
The risks go far beyond New Mexico. An AP analysis of data from the Global Oil and Gas Extraction Tracker found over 1,000 public schools across 13 states that are within five miles of a major oil or gas field. Major fields are collections of wells that produce the highest amount of energy in a state.
“This kind of air pollution has a real, measurable effect on students,” said Mike Gilraine, an economics professor at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada, who studies connections between air quality and student performance.
In 2024, Gilraine co-wrote a study showing student test scores were closely associated with air contamination. Each measured increase in PM2.5, a type of pollution created from the burning of fossil fuels, was associated with a significant decline in student test scores, Gilraine found. Conversely, researchers have documented that reductions in air pollution have led to higher test scores and fewer absences.
“To me, the surprise was certainly the magnitude of the effects” of air pollution on students, Gilraine said. “It’s hard to find a similar factor that would have such an impact on schools nationwide.”
America’s shift to natural gas has resulted in substantial increases in student achievement nationwide, Gilraine’s research shows, as it has displaced dirtier coal and led to cleaner air on the whole. But there has been little data on air quality across New Mexico, even as it has become one of the most productive states in the nation for natural gas. State regulators have installed only 20 permanent air monitors, most in areas without oil or gas production.
Independent researchers have extensively studied the air quality near schools in at least two locations in the state, however. One is Lybrook, which sits within a mile of 17 active oil and gas wells.
In 2024, scientists affiliated with Princeton and Northern Arizona universities conducted an air-monitoring study at the school, finding that levels of pollutants — including benzene, a cancer-causing byproduct of natural gas production that is particularly harmful to children — were spiking during school hours, to nearly double the levels known to cause chronic or acute health effects.
That research followed a 2021 health impact assessment conducted with support from several local nonprofits and foundations, which analyzed the effects of the area’s oil and gas development on residents.
The findings were startling: More than 90% of people surveyed suffered from sinus problems. Nosebleeds, shortness of breath and nausea were widespread. The report attributed the symptoms to the high levels of pollutants that researchers found — including, near Lybrook, hydrogen sulfide, a compound that gives off the sulfur smell that Amari Werito associated with his headaches.
Those studies helped confirm what many community members already knew, said Daniel Tso, a community leader who served on the committee that oversaw the 2021 health impact assessment.
“The children and the grandchildren need a safe homeland,” Tso said during an interview in March, standing outside a cluster of gas wells within a mile of Lybrook Elementary.
“You smell that?” he said, nodding towards a nearby wellhead, which smelled like propane. “That’s what the kids at the school are breathing in. I’ve had people visiting this area from New York. They spend five minutes here and say, ‘Hey, I got a headache.’ And the kids are what, six hours a day at the school breathing this?”
Lybrook school officials did not respond to requests for comment.
Despite risks, oil and gas can pump money into schools
Researchers have identified similar air quality problems in New Mexico’s southeast.
In 2023, a team of scientists from a coalition of universities conducted a detailed, yearlong study of the air in Loving, a small town in the Permian Basin. Local air quality, researchers found, was worse than in downtown Los Angeles, and the tested air contained the fifth-highest level of measured ozone contamination in the U.S.
The source of the ozone — a pollutant that’s especially hazardous to children — was the area’s network of gas wells and related infrastructure. Some of that infrastructure sits within a half-mile of a campus that houses Loving’s elementary, middle and high schools.
A small group of residents has spoken out about the area’s air quality, saying it has caused respiratory problems and other health issues. But for most locals, any concerns about pollution are outweighed by the industry’s economic benefits.
Representatives of the oil and gas industry have claimed the air quality studies themselves are not trustworthy.
“There needs to be a robust study to actually answer these questions,” said Andrea Felix, vice president of regulatory affairs for the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association (NMOGA). Felix said other sources of emissions, such as cars and trucks, are likely a larger source of air quality problems near wells.
“Companies follow the best available science” for well placement and emissions controls, Felix said, and also contribute huge amounts of money to the state’s education budget. In the most recent fiscal year, oil and gas revenue supported $1.7 billion in K-12 spending in New Mexico, according to a NMOGA report.
Officials with Loving Municipal Schools are also skeptical of the alarm over the wells. Loving Superintendent Lee White said the school district used funds from the oil and gas industry to pay for a new wing at the elementary school, a science lab for students, turf on the sports field and training and professional development for teachers. He said the industry’s contributions to state coffers can’t be ignored.
“Are we willing to give that up because people say our air is not clean?” he said during an interview. “It’s just as clean as anywhere else.”
As White spoke, a drill rig worked a couple of miles east of Loving’s elementary school while parents poured into the gymnasium to watch kindergartners collect their diplomas. White touted the district’s success, saying the elementary school scores above state averages for reading, math and science proficiency, while Loving’s high school students far outpace the state average for college and career readiness.
But environmental groups, attorneys and residents continue to push for limits on drilling near schools.
Those efforts saw a boost in 2023, when New Mexico State Land Commissioner Stephanie Garcia Richard issued an executive order prohibiting new oil and gas leases on state-owned land within a mile of schools.
Industry representatives decried the move, saying it added potentially insurmountable costs and barriers to drilling operators. However, AP’s analysis found that relatively few wells would be impacted even if the rule applied to all of New Mexico; only around 1% of oil and gas wells in the state are within a mile of a school.
In the years since, residents of areas where exploration is heavy have lobbied for legislation prohibiting gas operations within a mile of schools, regardless of land status. That bill died in committee during the most recent session of the New Mexico legislature.
Advocates have also sued the state over an alleged lack of pollution controls. That lawsuit is currently pending in state court.
____
AP journalist Sharon Lurye contributed to this report from New Orleans.
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The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
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