Christian ministers stood outside the steps of the Roundhouse on Monday and called on lawmakers to pass a measure that would further regulate New Mexico’s gun stores and would ban the sale of certain types of firearms.
Senate Bill 17 cleared the Senate on Saturday on a 21-17 vote after hours of debate. Supporters say it’s a necessary step to curb “straw purchases,” in which someone buys a gun on behalf of someone who legally cannot. But Republican lawmakers have called it an “extreme” and “unconstitutional” proposal in large part because of its ban on selling .50-caliber rifles and magazines that hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition.
In a Monday news conference, the pastors said they believe adopting SB17 would be a meaningful step in addressing New Mexico’s outsized problem with youth gun violence.
“In our faith traditions, we speak often about the concept of stewardship. Stewardship isn’t just raising money to keep our churches and buildings going. Stewardship is about caring for those who are in our communities,” the Rev. Lucas Grubbs, executive director of the New Mexico Conference of Churches, said. “Attacks with illicit firearms are direct assaults on the goodness of humanity and the image of God in one another.”
After Saturday’s vote, the bill now heads to the House of Representatives.
Lawmakers continue to focus on medical malpractice reform
House committees were scheduled to hear two medical malpractice reform bills on Monday. At a bill-signing ceremony earlier in February, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham doubled down on calling the reform one of her key priorities in her final regular legislative session as governor.
New Mexico currently does not have a limit on punitive damages that a jury can award in medical malpractice trials. Proposed legislation would put a limit on damages in many circumstances and would raise the standard of proof needed to award punitive damages.
The House Health and Human Services Committee kicked off the morning with a vote to advance House Bill 195, which would not allow awarded malpractice penalties to come from an independent provider’s personal income or assets except under limited circumstances.
The House Judiciary Committee was scheduled to discuss House Bill 99, the marquee medical malpractice reform bill after the House of Representatives’ floor session adjourned for the day. As of publication time, House floor proceedings continued and the committee had yet to convene on the bill and its controversial “unfriendly amendment” which would exempt corporate-owned hospitals from a cap on punitive damages.
The amendment would keep that cap in place for providers who practice at a corporate-owned hospital.
Tweaking removal process for wildlife governing board
Senate lawmakers on the Judiciary Committee advanced legislation to tweak the removal process for members of the state wildlife governing board Monday.
Senate Majority Leader Peter Wirth (D-Santa Fe), the sponsor for Senate Bill 104, said it was a continuation of laws passed in 2025 which reformed the state’s wildlife agency. Lujan Grisham line-item vetoed the proposed removal process in the Legislature’s final days, though.
SB104, if passed, would allow the governor to start a commissioner’s removal, which is overseen by the New Mexico Supreme Court. That’s a pared down version of the original process that required state ethics officials to open a proceeding in the state’s district courts.
Dancing ’round the rotunda
‘Our children’s care is not for sale’
Diana Lagunas, a 36-year-old Albuquerque mother, joined leaders from the nonprofit OLÉ Education Fund to back House Bill 269, which would place limitations on how private equity-owned child care centers use taxpayer dollars. It would prohibit those child care owners from spending public money on executive compensation or bonuses for an investment firm or for out-of-state operations.
“Our children’s care is not for sale,” Lagunas, who said she was dismayed to find broken windows and lacking security at her son’s private equity-owned daycare center, said.
Looking ahead: Regulations for data centers’ energy sources
At the last minute before the deadline to introduce new legislation, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham gave the OK for lawmakers to hear Senate Bill 235, known as the Microgrid Oversight Act. The Senate Conservation Committee is scheduled to discuss the bill Tuesday morning.
The bill, sponsored by Sen. Jeff Steinborn (D-Las Cruces), is aimed at the large data centers cropping up across New Mexico and the Southwest. Developers behind the multi-billion dollar Project Jupiter development in Doña Ana County have long proposed to power it with “microgrids” — self-reliant energy sources that do not draw from an existing power company’s grid. Generating new energy means looking for new resources, though. In the case of Project Jupiter, developers have proposed natural gas plants, which Source NM previously reported could emit more greenhouse gases than the state’s two largest cities combined.
Steinborn previously told Source NM he believes such developments are “an ecological disaster in the making” and said he’s concerned that without proper oversight, they could flout the state’s existing clean energy requirements. His oversight proposal comes as the Clear Horizons Act, which would codify statewide emission reduction goals into law, proceeds through the Legislature.
