Thursday, November 04, 2021Clippings From Our Election Night Newsroom Floor --ABQ Mayor Tim Keller avoided a runoff election by getting 56 percent of the vote Tuesday but don't expect him to take a long vacation. Keller has to now worry about runoff elections in City Council Districts 7 and 9 that could weaken his hand if R's make inroads. Expect to see him in those districts as the December 7 runoffs near. Senior Alligators say the Keller camp will get behind a PAC to aid the campaigns of Tammy Fiebelkorn in District 7 and Rob Grilley in District 9. Fiebelkorn faces GOP real estate agent Lori Lee Robertson and Grilley faces Republican Rene Grout. --Looking further ahead to the required redistricting of the nine city council seats in the new year, you are among the first to learn that a Movida could be brewing that would throw newly elected conservative westside city councilors Dan Lewis and Louie Sanchez into the same district. If successful that could boost liberals as only one of the conservatives could survive. --Sen. Martin Heinrich's new thing is to endorse candidates far and wide but it's catching up with him and he took a hit Election Night: I'd like to thank all 26 of the local candidates I endorsed for the passion and time they put in to run for local office. I also want to congratulate 15 of those candidates on winning their elections, and to one more for qualifying for a run-off. That's only a 57 percent win percentage for Heinrich, raising the question of whether the state's senior senator wants to continue with his new pastime. --Freshman ABQ Dem US Rep. Melanie Stansbury also got the endorsement itch and ended up with only two winners among the eight candidates she endorsed. How about something else for a hobby, Melanie? READER CLIPS From Jim McClure in Los Lunas: Joe, it looks like the APS school board election amounted to an upset for the teachers’ union. How much did moving the school board election to the city’s election day increase voter turnout for the school board race? My impression was that the old school election, on a separate day with polling places in schools, depressed turnout. This made voting easy for school employees and inconvenient for everyone else. News reports noted that APS candidates endorsed by a business group were largely successful. Is the first time any organization other than the teachers’ union endorsed candidates? Moving the school board election to the much larger turnout city election from a stand alone February election was key to the defeat of the Dem/union backed school board candidates. As for organizational backing in the past, there may have been some but nothing as financially prominent as the support business groups gave their favored candidates this year. They won three out of the four seats up for election to the seven member board. THE BOTTOM LINES
Joe, you continue to be my “go to“ election night “essential“ since you hit the KANW radio airwaves back in the ’80s (I guess). Even more amazing is the ebbs and flows of your ensemble cast through the years and you/they always make it lively. My greatest compliment to you is that you continue to be the most authoritative and professional source for political news and election night results in New Mexico, Gracias, Amigo. De Nada, Bob. Our first appearance on the radio airwaves was in 1974 when we reported for KUNM on that year's ABQ mayoral race, the first under the then new city council/mayor form of government. Frank once said: "May you live to be 100 and may the last voice you hear be mine." We're working on it. Reporting from Albuquerque, I'm Joe Monahan and. . . This is the home of New Mexico politics. E-mail your news and comments. (newsguy@yahoo.com) Interested in reaching New Mexico's most informed audience? Advertise here.   (c)NM POLITICS WITH JOE MONAHAN 2021 |
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