Cases
New Mexico v. Oliver
CASE SUMMARY
Did we achieve our litigation objective? No. The New Mexico Supreme Court did not prevent the New Mexico Secretary of State from acting beyond her legal authority.
Court Outcome: Following Governor Susana Martinez’s veto of SB96, the New Mexico Secretary of State created a regulation nearly identical to SB96. The New Mexico Supreme Court refused mandamus jurisdiction to strike down this violation of New Mexico’s separation of powers.
Larger Impact: The American system of government gives legislatures the exclusive power to write laws. The Court’s failure to uphold this constitutional bulwark shifts power from elected officials to unelected bureaucrats.
Summary: In 2017, the New Mexico Legislature passed Senate Bill 96 (SB96), but Governor Susana Martinez promptly vetoed it. On the very same day of the Governor’s veto, New Mexico’s Secretary of State declared that she would make the policies and provisions of SB96 law through rulemaking. Just five months later, the Secretary adopted her Campaign Finance Rule—a regulation substantively identical to SB96, that alters, modifies, and expands the reach of New Mexico issue-advocacy reporting laws. An executive department administrator thereby accomplished the extraordinary feat of using an administrative decree to veto a veto, resurrecting the policies and strictures of a dead bill and creating a regulation that is very much alive.
The New Mexico Constitution does not confer authority upon the Secretary to override a veto. The Secretary’s regulation arrogated the Legislature’s exclusive constitutional authority to establish public policy and to make law, and it nullified the Governor’s exclusive constitutional authority to veto bills and the Legislature’s exclusive constitutional authority to override gubernatorial vetoes.
NCLA petitioned New Mexico’s Supreme Court to issue an extraordinary writ to undo the Secretary’s audacious breach of New Mexico’s separation of powers. Regrettably, the Supreme Court declined to hear oral arguments or rule on the merits of the parties’ briefs, preferring to let another court take up the matter.
RELEVANT MATERIALS
NCLA FILINGS
Order of the Supreme Court of the State of New Mexico
March 8, 2019 | Read More
Petitioners’ Opposition to Respondent’s Motion to Stay the Proceedings and Disclosure of New Controlling Case Law
February 15, 2019 | Read More
Secretary of State’s Verified Response
February 8, 2019 | Read More
Motion to Stay the Proceedings
February 1, 2019 | Read More
New Mexico v. Maggie Toulouse Oliver Order Requesting Response
January 7, 2019 | Read More
PRESS RELEASES
New Mexico’s Secretary of State Tries to Veto Governor’s Veto
December 20, 2019