Governor lauds senators after CYFD oversight bill revised, but drama might not be over

SANTA FE — The Senate voted Friday to approve legislation creating a new outside oversight office in New Mexico’s child welfare agency, but only after adopting amendments to the bill that could avert a veto showdown with Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham.

The changes to the legislation were lauded by the governor, but could set up a new conflict with top House Democrats, who have pushed the bill after years of debate over dismal child well-being trends.

After the bill, House Bill 5, sailed through its only assigned Senate committee earlier this week, some senators appeared to have second thoughts Friday.

The Senate ultimately voted 28-13 to approve the bill after adding an amendment offered by Sen. Katy Duhigg, D-Albuquerque, aimed at avoiding conflicts of interest as child well-being investigations are carried out.

After the vote, Lujan Grisham told the Journal she had met with several senators earlier in the day and urged them to make the change to the legislation.

She said she believed the initial House-approved version of the bill was unconstitutional, while likening backers’ efforts to rush the bill through the Roundhouse to President Donald Trump’s attack on political enemies at the U.S. Department of Justice on Friday.

“You don’t use children, and their families and their well-being as some sort of political effort to harm or discredit another elected official,” the governor told the Journal.

“Don’t hold children’s well-being hostage because you’ve got a political beef with me about one thing or another,” she later added.

The Democratic governor also said she still doesn’t like the bill’s provision that a new Office of the Child Advocate would be located within Attorney General Raúl Torrez’s office but lauded several senators for their roles in the debate and the final vote.

Those senators included Duhigg, Senate President Pro Tem Mimi Stewart, D-Albuquerque, Senate Democratic whip Michael Padilla of Albuquerque, Sen. Crystal Brantley, R-Elephant Butte, and Senate GOP floor leader William Sharer of Farmington.

Due to the bill changes adopted Friday, it now returns to the House of Representatives, where members will vote in the coming days on whether to approve the Senate’s changes.

If the changes are rejected, it would set up a conference committee where appointees from the two chambers would meet to try to hammer out a deal before the 60-day session ends March 22.

House Speaker Javier Martínez, D-Albuquerque, said he and his staff are still reviewing the Senate amendments. But he described some of the changes as concerning, including a removal of subpoena power for the proposed outside office.

“It’s not good practice for us to tailor our policymaking to fit the vision or the view of any particular governor,” Martínez told the Journal. “It is our job to pass good legislation.”

But the Senate’s actions on Friday appeared to dim the odds — at least for now — of lawmakers attempting to override a Lujan Grisham veto of the bill.

Duhigg alluded to such an effort during Friday’s floor debate, saying, “I know there are some that would love to force this to a veto and do an override.”

She said the better course of action would be to pass a bill with buy-in from the governor’s administration.

“The more we can be in partnership, the better,” Duhigg said in an interview after Friday’s vote.

The outside oversight bill is one of roughly 30 measures dealing with CYFD and New Mexico foster families that have been filed during this year’s session.

Sara Crecca, an Albuquerque attorney who has represented children in CYFD custody for more than 20 years, said Friday she has never seen the agency in its current level of “disrepair.”

But she said she’s hopeful the bill will help children around the state if it’s signed into law.

“The office of the child advocate will empower them, their parents and their foster parents in their battle for basic care in our broken child welfare system,” Crecca told the Journal.