A new Democratic congresscritter

Today a headline that did my heart good. State Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D) easily won the Albuquerque-area district left by U.S. Rep. Deb Haaland when Haaland was appointed President Biden’s interior secretary.

This is a district I know something about. The E.P. and I worked in it during 2004, John Kerry's failed run to replace George W. Bush in the White House. Though not directly engaged in the Congressional campaign, we were constantly aware that this working class, heavily Latinx city had an entrenched Republican Congresswoman who no effort could seem to displace. Our get-out-the-vote mobilization didn't do the trick either. Heather Wilson was first elected in 1996 and lasted through 2007. 

The seat finally turned Blue in 2008 and has remained in the Democratic column ever since. (It's reliable Blue status was one of the reasons Biden could risk pulling Haaland out of it.) It has served as a launching pad for the upward path of Martin Heinrich, now one of New Mexico's U.S. Senators, as well as the state's current Governor, Michelle Lujan Grisham.

Stansbury is a New Mexico native, who served as a policy advisor to the Council on Environmental Quality during the Obama administration. 

Her Republican opponent tried to take her down by highlighting her support for the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act and endorsement of the Breathe Act, a proposal from the Movement for Black Lives that would redirect federal law enforcement grants to social services. Like many cities, Albuquerque has seen an increase in homicides in the pandemic year. But the police department also admitted to ballooning reports of police misconduct, 275 percent more than in previous years. Voters made a choice.