Oh, Susana! FBI comes knocking, State Police say Gov's staff ordered spying on Dem

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Tuesday June 11, 2013 · 8:34 AM PDT

2013/06/11 · 08:34

New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez has been on a barnstorming national fundraising tour for the past few weeks, with stops in Ohio, Texas and capping it off with a $220,000 fundraiser in DC.

But while she was out of town polishing off her national spotlight her home got very messy. Two big scandals about Martinez have broken over the past two weeks and the governor's supporters are working overtime in the spin zone.

To date, three key members of Martinez's 2010 campaign team - a campaign manager, the finance director and her personal assistant (body man, or woman in this case) - all came forward to say they were questioned by the FBI about a shadow government email system used by Martinez staffers and the awarding of a lucrative casino-racetrack lease to a major campaign contributor.

This week, the group ProgressNow New Mexico released a memo from a State Police officer claiming that the governor's general counsel and a former Republican district attorney directed him to surreptitiously record the newly elected Democratic district attorney whom Martinez actively campaigned against in 2012.

They say bad news comes in threes. With two scandals in two weeks, it makes one wonder what comes next?

Congressman Pearce: More FEMA relief for my state, none for yours.

ChileVerde

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Saturday January 05, 2013 · 3:57 PM PST

2013/01/05 · 15:57

Cong. Steve Pearce (NM-2)

New Mexico's Tea Party Congressman Steve Pearce (R) was one of 67 Republicans to vote against Hurricane Sandy relief earlier this week - two and a half-months after the superstorm killed more than 100 people and brought trillions of dollars of damage to Northeastern states.

Though Pearce was quick to say "NO" to his colleagues and fellow Americans in states from North Carolina to Maine suffering from Sandy, he has had no problem asking those same Americans to bail out New Mexicans from countless past natural disasters.

During the previous Congress - the same one in which Republicans failed to even hear Sandy relief - Pearce sponsored HR6017 to allow the FEMA administrator to suspend a waiting requirement for federal flood insurance for victims of New Mexico's wildfire season. Had it passed, it would have opened up more federal disaster aid money, paid for by all American taxpayers, to aid his constituents. Then, in September, Pearce wrote in a public letter to the Ruidoso Free Press, "I applaud this federal response" after FEMA stepped up to assist communities like Ruidoso, Alamagordo and Lincoln County in his district affected by wildfires and flooding. Similarly, in 2008, he notified FEMA to be alert to a possibility that flooding in Aztec, New Mexico (not even his district) could require FEMA disaster relief.

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