{"id":51095,"date":"2020-10-09T18:00:56","date_gmt":"2020-10-10T00:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/northern-new-mexico-district-to-pick-its-first-congresswoman\/"},"modified":"2020-10-10T00:00:56","modified_gmt":"2020-10-10T00:00:56","slug":"northern-new-mexico-district-to-pick-its-first-congresswoman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/northern-new-mexico-district-to-pick-its-first-congresswoman\/","title":{"rendered":"Northern New Mexico district to pick its first congresswoman"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Democratic
Democratic congressional candidate Teresa Leger Fernandez, in the blue mask, cheers on supporters at a polling station June 2 in Santa Fe. Fernandez was flanked by her three sons, left to right, Alisandro, Dario and Abelino. The sign she holds, \u201cAhora es cuando,\u201d is Spanish for \u201cNow is the time.\u201d<\/span>Cedar Attanasio\/Associated Press file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\"Republican
Republican congressional candidate Alexis Johnson awaits final results in New Mexico&#x2019;s primary election outside a public works building where local election officials tallied absentee votes June 5 in Santa Fe.<\/span>Morgan Lee\/Associated Press file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

This first debate of the race pit Democratic attorney Teresa Leger Fernandez of Santa Fe against Republican Alexis Johnson, also of Santa Fe, to succeed U.S. Rep Ben Ray Luj\u00e1n in Congress. Luj\u00e1n is running in an open U.S. Senate race as Sen. Tom Udall retires.<\/p>\n

Democrats have monopolized the northern 3rd Congressional District since its creation in 1983 with the exception of one special election.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter 30 years of failed leadership, it\u2019s time for a change,\u201d Johnson said in a remote debate from separate locations. She criticized Democrats of failing to substantially expand infrastructure for water and broadband internet.<\/p>\n

Johnson, an environmental engineer for oilfield clients, cast herself as a pragmatist on wildfire prevention, through better management of forests and dead wood, and on energy policies that don\u2019t abandon fossil fuels. President Donald Trump has attributed catastrophic wildfires on the West Coast to poor forest management alone.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy approach is a balanced, sensible approach,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cShe (Leger Fernandez) promotes the Green New Deal. \u2026 You\u2019re going to fuel New Mexico by only solar panels and only wind turbines. That is an extreme policy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fernandez Leger warned that if New Mexico ignores climate change \u201cthe pain we will feel will be drastic.\u201d She defended her support for the Green New Deal as a concept for promoting investments in clean-energy infrastructure.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat that says is that while we are attacking our climate crisis, let\u2019s also make sure that we invest in those communities that have helped power us, which means that we\u2019re going to invest in Farmington,\u201d Leger Fernandez said, alluding to the phase-out of coal-fired power plants in the northwest of the state.<\/p>\n

Leger Fernandez accused her opponent of being invested in the future of the oil industry through a family business, which Johnson angrily refuted and said the business promotes \u201cwastewater recycling\u201d and geothermal energy.<\/p>\n

On health care access, Johnson said she would focus her energies in Congress on increasing transparency in medical billing, reducing prescription drug prices and lowering insurance premiums for the middle class.<\/p>\n

Leger Fernandez warned that health care consumer protections are under threat from Republican efforts to overturn the Affordable Care Act. She outlined her support for moving the country away from an employer-based health care system toward a single-payer insurance model run by the government.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do believe that there is a big difference in terms of what we are suggesting here,\u201d she said. \u201cDemocrats and myself, we are talking about making sure that health care is available to all. We are talking about maintaining the Affordable Care Act while the Republicans are trying to get rid of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The winner in November will become the first woman to hold the seat, which has been a political stepping stone for prominent Democrats including former Gov. Bill Richardson.<\/p>\n

Johnson secured the GOP nomination with an unconventional campaign that emphasized both her Hispanic and indigenous family roots and her status as a political outsider.<\/p>\n

In a recent PBS interview, Johnson said she voted in 2016 for Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson and that she is inspired by the activist energy of liberal firebrands such as Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio Cortez and recently deceased U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, though she disagrees philosophically.<\/p>\n

At the same time, Johnson is running on an outspoken anti-abortion platform. She was cited by police for not wearing a face mask in public on the central plaza of Santa Fe in July, but says her thinking has evolved and she now abides by the statewide health requirement.<\/p>\n

Leger Fernandez, a legal advocate for Native American communities and voter access initiatives, emerged from a crowded field of Democratic primary candidates that included former CIA operative Valerie Plame.<\/p>\n

Leger Fernandez\u2019s campaign is backed by a long list of advocacy groups for progressive causes and greater Latina representation in Congress, and gained early political endorsements from U.S. Rep. Debra Haaland of Albuquerque and U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who ran for president.<\/p>\n

The coronavirus pandemic has rampaged across swaths of the 3rd District that overlap the Navajo Nation, highlighting the vulnerability of households that go without full indoor plumbing or electricity.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy don\u2019t we have water or electricity in Navajo Nation?\u201d Johnson said. \u201cBen Ray Luj\u00e1n hasn\u2019t delivered, he endorsed my opponent and it\u2019s going to be the status quo.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leger Fernandez has emphasized her dedication to corralling greater federal investment in rural infrastructure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Democratic congressional candidate Teresa Leger Fernandez, in the blue mask, cheers on supporters at a polling station June 2 in Santa Fe. Fernandez was flanked by her three sons, left to right, Alisandro, Dario and Abelino. The sign she holds, \u201cAhora es cuando,\u201d is Spanish for \u201cNow is the time.\u201dCedar Attanasio\/Associated Press file Republican congressional […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":51096,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[815],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-51095","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-associated-press-new-mexico"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51095","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51095"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51095\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51095"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51095"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51095"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=51095"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}