DPNM calls on Steve Pearce’s New Mexico GOP to denounce election denial ahead of the 2024 election

Last Saturday, April 27th, the Republican Party of New Mexico held their Quadrennial Convention in Albuquerque to select their delegates to the Republican National Convention and their five presidential electors, chosen by NM GOP Chair “Amarillo” Steve Pearce and confirmed by the NM GOP Executive Committee. Among the five electors chosen was Debbie Weh-Maestas, one of New Mexico’s notorious fake electors who partook in a scheme to falsely award New Mexico’s electoral votes to Donald Trump after he lost the 2020 presidential election and was subpoenaed by the January 6th Committee.

Less than a week after an Arizona grand jury indicted 18 individuals, including Rudy Giuliani, in their state’s fake elector scheme, Steve Pearce’s defunct state party selected a known fake elector to the same position yet again in an affront to New Mexico’s voters. Donald Trump lost New Mexico to President Biden by a decisive 11%, making their fake elector scheme all the more absurd and proving that New Mexico Republican leadership like Pearce and Weh-Maestas have no respect for the democratic process. 

Nella Domenici’s first quarterly FEC filing of her campaign revealed that she accepted a $500 campaign donation from Weh-Maestas last month and has so far refused to return the money or explain her decision to keep it. After accepting campaign cash from a fake elector and contributing the maximum amount allowed to Yvette Herrell, who voted against certifying the 2020 results, it is clear Nella is aligning herself with the most far-right faction of the New Mexican Republican Party. 

“It is sad to see Steve Pearce’s Republican Party continue to make a mockery of democracy,” said Democratic Party of New Mexico Spokesperson Daniel Garcia. “We already know that Debbie Weh-Maestas was one of the fake electors who peddled unfounded conspiracy theories and disregarded the will of New Mexico’s voters as an elector for the 2020 election, yet Steve Pearce and the NM GOP disrespect New Mexico by selecting her to be an elector yet again. On behalf of New Mexico’s voters, DPNM calls on Steve Pearce, Nella Domenici, and their New Mexico Republican Party to accept the 2024 election results, win or lose.”

With the history that many of the most prominent figures in New Mexico’s GOP have with election denial and associating with extremists, voters should worry that Nella is putting the extremists of the New Mexico Republican Party ahead of them.