Our View: Pseudo-Drama Over Congressional Districts Kicks Off in Lovington Courtroom; Southern District Remains Winnable By GOP And The New Districts Will Stand, Plus: The Los Alamos Boom

So Republican Yvette Herrell is running neck and neck with Dem US Rep. Gabe Vasquez in the first public poll of their expected 2024 rematch but somehow the southern congressional district has been gerrymandering to screw the Republicans?

That is the fallacy of the pseudo-drama going on in a Lovington courtroom where the new congressional districts implemented in the 2022 election are being challenged as unfair by the GOP 

Where is the "dilution"of the Republican vote when the district is still acting as a swing district as it did before the redistricting--when Dem Xochitl Torres Small took the Second Congressional District seat in '18 and then lost it to Herrell in '20?

And then you have every national pundit worth their crystal ball and with access to the nitty gritty precinct data rating the Vasquez-Herrell race a toss up--a rarity in congressional races. 

And then you have Vasquez only winning the seat in '22 by 1,350 votes. That's a gerrymander? Talk about gaslighting. 

Like we said, it is a fake drama--political theater--going on in Lovington this week. 

In fact the Dems are being criticized by their own for not being bolder in redistricting by guaranteeing a Dem congressman for the next ten years. They could have easily done it and might have if the then Speaker of the House hadn't mouthed off about how he was going to do just that.  

And dividing up Hobbs and Roswell is sacrilege? Hey, ABQ was split up three ways to form the three new congressional districts. Where's the outrage there? There is none because the time had come as the metro now so dominates the state. 

For those reasons and more we don't see the need for new districts to be ordered by the State Supreme Court when they review the results of the three-day bench trial that will end Friday in Lovington.

Having a Republican in the congressional delegation is not a bad idea from a strategic point of view for our state, but the GOP has diminished itself and has not grown its ranks. They have to earn the seat--not get it by seeking a court-ordered gerrymander from a friendly Republican judge. 

 

DATELINE LOS ALAMOS 

Ten years ago Los Alamos Labs was suffering layoffs and budget cuts. Today it is in the midst of the biggest boom in its history. The AP:

. . . Los Alamos National Laboratory takes part in the nation’s most ambitious nuclear weapons effort since World War II. The mission calls for modernizing the arsenal with droves of new workers producing plutonium cores — key components for nuclear weapons. Some 3,300 workers have been hired in the last two years, with the workforce now topping more than 17,270. Close to half of them commute to work from elsewhere in northern New Mexico and from as far away as Albuquerque, helping to nearly double Los Alamos’ population during the work week. The U.S. will spend more than $750 billion over the next decade to overhaul nearly every part of its nuclear defenses and replace systems that in some cases are more than 50 years old. . .

17,000. That's all-time high employment at the Labs and an uncomfortable fact for those opposed to the build-out of nuclear weapons. On the other hand, the stability the boom provides for the northern economy can't be denied. 

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(c)NM POLITICS WITH JOE MONAHAN 2023