Closed-door disagreements about a special New Mexico legislative session on crime spilled into public view Monday, with the governor and top legislative leaders hosting dueling press conferences blaming each other for an impasse just days before lawmakers are set to convene. Lawmakers accused the governor of presenting half-baked half-measures to the state’s long-standing problems at the intersection of mental health care, drugs and crime, Source NM reports. “We do not believe these concerns can be effectively remedied in a very condensed special legislative session,” said House Speaker Javier Martínez, a Democrat. Michelle Lujan Grisham used a homeless encampment in Albuquerque as a backdrop for an impromptu news conference. She urged residents to pressure lawmakers to introduce her legislation at the special session.
“They were never serious about supporting any of these issues in the first place, and my message for them on behalf of the business owners and the people living here is: shame on you,” the governor said. Martínez said legislative leaders are serious, but they have deep concerns about the proposals’ potential to harm people facing mental health crises. “We are not afraid of hard work,” he said. “We’re also not afraid of standing up for what is right, right now, and potentially rushing these bills is not right for New Mexico.” The governor’s agenda would make it easier for police to commit people with psychiatric diagnoses involuntarily or for courts to hold them in jail. It would also ban loitering on certain medians across the state and raise penalties for having a gun if someone has a prior felony conviction. The governor said legislative leaders told her Friday they wouldn’t work on any bills and that their members hadn’t read her proposals. She said lawmakers canceled both a meeting with the governor and hearings on proposed legislation set for Monday morning.