Screenshot of New Mexico Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver and other election officials from across the country at the U.S. Senate Committee on Rules and Administration on March 28, 2023.
Congress & Federal Issues

Toulouse Oliver talks to Senate about NM elections

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New Mexico Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver testified Tuesday in front of the U.S. Senate Committee on Rules and Administration about elections. The committee heard from Toulouse Oliver and other election officials during a hearing about state and local administration. “The health of our democracy depends on informed discussions like this about the challenges and opportunities faced by election administrators across our country,” Toulouse Oliver said. “My goal today is to provide you with insight into how election administrators are coping with the new voting and elections landscape and to highlight some of the initiatives we’re taking in New Mexico to support the vital work of county clerks and their staff, poll workers, and the myriad other election professionals who make our American democracy a model for the world.”

Toulouse Oliver discussed how misinformation and election denialism since the 2020 election cycle has made the jobs of election administrators and workers more difficult.

“When many members of the public are mistrustful about the integrity of our elections, election administrators then bear the associated burdens of frivolous lawsuits, excessively burdensome public information requests, disruptive voters and poll workers, and outright threats and harassment,” Toulouse Oliver said. “One of the most important tactics to defend against the detrimental consequences of election misinformation is simply putting good policies in place that are informed by election administrators themselves.”

More: Election reform bills pass Legislature

Three such bills passed the New Mexico Legislature in the 2023 session.

A "Vote Here" sign at the Otero County Fairgrounds in Alamogordo.
Elections

Election reform bills pass Legislature

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The 60-day legislative session has come to an end with sweeping changes coming to New Mexico elections, pending the governor’s signature. HB 4 included many of the changes, including expanding voter rights. 

The bill provides voting protections and improved voting access for Native Americans through the Native American Voting Rights Act, enhances voter registration systems and voter data privacy, restores voting rights to formerly incarcerated felons, created a voluntary permanent absentee ballot list which allows voters who usually vote by absentee ballot to be on a list so they don’t have to reapply for each election, sets up automatic voter registration when updating address or presenting documents at Motor Vehicle Divisions and other state agencies and designates Election Day as a school holiday. Once signed, the bill goes into effect in annual phases beginning in July 2023.  More: Voting rights expansion bill heads to governor’s desk

A bill similar to HB 4 passed on March 14. SB 180, a bill to make more technical changes to elections, also passed both the House and Senate this year after vigorous debate.

Elections

Bill updating election code passes House

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The state House of Representatives approved a bill that updates the state Election Code on a 44-25 vote. SB 180 requests an update the state’s Election Code including specifying when the Inspection of Public Records Act, or IPRA, can be used for election information, allowing electronic nominating petition signatures, creating an election security program, requiring training for election challengers and watchers, revising requirements for the impoundment of ballots, audits, voting machine rechecks and recounts, revising election-related crimes and authorizing taxpayer information to be revealed to the secretary of state for purposes of maintaining voter registration records. More: Bill updating Election Code heads to House floor

Debate on the House floor included questions from opponents about how safe drop boxes are and whether the closed circuit video from the drop boxes are subject to inspection under the state’s open records law, as well as questions about how electronic signatures for candidate nominating petitions can be used as well as paper petitions with personal signatures. Majority Floor Leader Gail Chasey said while presenting the bill that no ballot boxes are connected to the internet which has been a worry by those who falsely claim the 2020 presidential election results were not accurate. 

More than 60 lawsuits were filed contesting election counting processes. These lawsuits either failed, were dropped or are ongoing.

Elections
A "Vote Here" sign at the Otero County Fairgrounds in Alamogordo.

Bill to make intimidating an election official a felony goes to governor

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The House floor approved a bill on a 62-1 vote to make it a fourth degree felony to intimidate election workers such as poll workers and county clerks and other election employees. The bill would expand the state’s election code to include the penalties. There was no debate on the bill. SB 43 passed the Senate unanimously. More: Bill prohibiting intimidation of election officials moves to House floor

“SB 43 amends the election code to make intimidation of an election official a felony.

Elections
A "Vote Here" sign at the Otero County Fairgrounds in Alamogordo.

Bill updating Election Code heads to House floor

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Legislation that aims to update the state’s Election Code passed the House Judiciary Committee on a 6-4 vote on Saturday. SB 180 requests an update the state’s Election Code including specifying when the Inspection of Public Records Act, or IPRA, can be used for election information, allowing electronic nominating petition signatures, creating an election security program, requiring training for election challengers and watchers, revising requirements for the impoundment of ballots, audits, voting machine rechecks and recounts, revising election-related crimes and authorizing taxpayer information to be revealed to the secretary of state for purposes of maintaining voter registration records. More: Election code update passes Senate

The bill was discussed but not voted on during a Friday afternoon HJC meeting with discussion continuing during the Saturday, March 11 meeting. “These changes are absolutely necessary for the conduct of elections,” Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver said. The bill is similar to the Voting Rights Act, HB 4, which is a policy bill while SB 180 is a technical bill, Toulouse Oliver said.

Elections
"Vote Here" signs in front of the Otero County Administration Building on New York Avenue in Alamogordo.

Bill prohibiting intimidation of election officials moves to House floor

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A bill that makes intimidating election officials a felony passed in the House Judiciary Committee on a 10-0 vote. SB 43 would expand the state Election Code’s scope by making it a fourth-degree felony to intimidate election workers such as poll workers and county clerks and other election employees. “Under current law, if someone is a voter or a watcher or a challenger, and someone seeks to intimidate them, tries to induce fear using threatened use of force, violence, infliction of harm or loss or any form of economic retaliation for the purpose of impeding their free elective franchise or the impartial administration of the electric code that is a fourth degree felony,” bill sponsor Sen. Katy Duhigg, D-Albuquerque, said. “What this bill does is it extends those same protections to the people who are actually running our elections: the Secretary of State’s office, their employees and agents, or county clerks, or municipal clerks and their employees and agents.”

More: Bill making intimidation of election officials a felony moves to Senate floor

The bill’s origin comes from a wave of threats of violence against election workers, including threats to Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver. 

The bill passed the Senate unanimously on Feb. 16.

Elections
A "Vote Here" sign at the Otero County Fairgrounds in Alamogordo.

Election Code updates bill passes first House committee

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A bill updating the state Election Code passed the House Government, Elections and Indian Affairs Committee Monday on a party line 6-3 vote. SB 180 requests an update the state’s Election Code including, but not limited to, specifying when the Inspection of Public Records Act, or IPRA, can be used in election-based disclosures, allowing electronic nominating petition signatures, creating an election security program, requiring training for election challengers and watchers, revising requirements for the impoundment of ballots, audits, voting machine rechecks and recounts, revising election-related crimes and authorizing taxpayer information to be revealed to the secretary of state for purposes of maintaining voter registration records. More: Election code update passes Senate

“All the changes that are in this bill (are based on) actual experiences of machine administrators and a lot of them have already been tested because a lot of this is stuff that was adopted temporarily during the 2020s,” bill sponsor Sen. Katy Duhigg, D-Albuquerque, said. 

The bill previously passed the Senate on a 23-13 vote. It now heads to the House Judiciary Committee.

Elections
Screenshot of Sen. Katy Duhigg, D-Albuquerque, during a Senate floor session on Feb. 25, 2023, discussing SB 180 which updates elections in New Mexico.

Election code update passes Senate

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The state Senate approved a bill seeking to update the state election code on a 23-13, party-line vote. SB 180 seeks to update the state’s Election Code including, but not limited to, specifying when the Inspection of Public Records Act, or IPRA, can be used in election-based disclosures, allowing electronic nominating petition signatures, creating an election security program, requiring training for election challengers and watchers, revising requirements for the impoundment of ballots, audits, voting machine rechecks and recounts, revising election-related crimes and authorizing taxpayer information to be revealed to the secretary of state for purposes of maintaining voter registration records. “This is a bill that should look very familiar to this body because we’ve seen it for three years now,” Duhigg said. “SB180 is simply a pared down version of last year’s rendition, which was SB 6, which passed this body unanimously… But all of the changes that are in this bill, are borne from actual experiences that our election administrators have been navigating. Many of them have already been bug tested.”

Many of the bill’s provisions were activated on a temporary basis during the 2020 election due to the COVID-19 public health crisis.

Elections
"Vote Here" signs in front of the Otero County Administration Building on New York Avenue in Alamogordo.

Bill prohibiting firearms at polling places moves to House

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A bill prohibiting firearms at polling places passed the Senate and now heads to the House for consideration. SB 44 was passed on a 28-9 vote Wednesday. “(SB 44) prohibits the carrying of a firearm within 100 feet of a polling place during an election, with an exception for peace officers,” bill co-sponsor Sen. Peter Wirth, D-Santa Fe, said. “This puts in place the same rule that already exists when a polling place is at a school. Currently, when a polling place is at a school, you cannot have a firearm.

A "Vote Here" sign at the Otero County Fairgrounds in Alamogordo.
Elections

Voting rights bill clears its first committee

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The House Government, Elections and Indian Affairs Committee approved a bill on Wednesday that would update the state election code. The bill passed on a party line 6-3 vote with the three Republicans on the committee voting against the bill. HB 4 would add automatic voter registration, restore a released felon’s right to vote, create a voluntary permanent absentee voter and add voting protections and improved access for Native Americans. It also makes general or local election days school holidays and allows counties to apply for more secured ballot boxes. The committee rolled over HB 4 during the Friday meeting last week due to time constraints after hearing public comment.