Funding for New Mexico in Focus is provided by viewers like you.

>> Nash: This week on New Mexico in Focus, The Downwinders finally get their day as the feds okay compensation for generations harmed by the first atomic blast.

>> Cordova: There were many times when I said to myself, they will acknowledge us.

And now that we're there, that acknowledgment has become so important.

>> And a Republican lawmaker from the state's southern edge praises President Trump's big bill and urges state leaders to fill gaps.

New Mexico in Focus starts now.

Thanks for joining us I'm Nash Jones.

President Trump this month signed a massive tax and spending bill, also referred to as the budget reconciliation bill or, controversially, the one big beautiful bill.

And its implications are large, too.

Nationwide and here in New Mexico.

So this week we're going to dig into a few key ways that the president's huge overhaul will show up here at home.

Our state is the country's second largest oil producer.

Revenue from the industry makes possible the record high budgets the states enacted over the last few years.

So, in collaboration with capital and main correspondent Jerry Redfern, speaks with an environmental attorney about how the big bill relates to our public lands and past moves by the Trump administration to boost drilling and sideline regulations.

We'll also hear from a state Republican senator, Jim Townsend, who says he's optimistic about the federal tax and spending plan.

With those changes to oil and gas regulations being one positive in his mind.

But we begin with a difficult milestone and a long awaited acknowledgment for tens of thousands of New Mexicans.

80 years after the Trinity test, the first ever detonation of a nuclear bomb.

The big bill not only reauthorized the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act or RECA, but also expanded it to include New Mexicans.

People gathered at the Trinity site in southern New Mexico Wednesday to commemorate the day that changed the lives of their families forever.

The Tularosa Basin Downwinders consortium held events as they do every year, but this year carried a bit more of a celebratory tone, not only because of the changes to RECA, but also because of the installation of a new sign formally acknowledging the horrors that the Trinity test inflicted on people from that area.

Democratic state representative Joann Ferrary sponsored the memorial.

They got the sign made this year.

Tina Cordova, the president and co-founder of the Downwinders, explains what's on the sign and why it means so much to her community.

>> Cordova: There's a wonderful about who we were.

You know, how we lived here, how we didn't receive warning and how we've been dying.

And we're the human collateral damage.

And then on the reverse side of the sign, there's this amazing map that was constructed by a student at UNM named Brian Kendall.

And the map actually shows that there were 13,000 people living in a 50 mile radius.

Because the government developed a narrative early on that it was remote and uninhabited.

No one lived here.

No one was harmed.

And we always challenged that.

That beautiful map, it it communicates everything about the fact that we were here.

Thanks to NMIF reporter Cailley Chella for capturing the dedication at the Trinity site.

The advocate you just heard from Tina Cordova has made a life's work of fighting for downwinders exposed to radiation during and after the Trinity test.

This month, her 20 year fight paid off.

I sat down with Cordova in our Albuquerque studio this week to ask about the specifics of how New Mexicans can apply for compensation, and what a federal acknowledgment means for the tens of thousands in the state who felt alone in this fight for decades.

>> Nash: Tina Cordova, thanks so for coming into the studio.

>> Cordova: Oh, it's a it's a pleasure to be with you.

Thanks for asking me to join you.

>> Nash: So the newly reauthorized and expanded Radiation Exposure Compensation Act.

Who does it compensate that RECA previously did not?

>> Cordova: Well, everybody in the state of New Mexico that's been left out for the 35 years that the program has been in place.

So while some people think this is a program that's only going to be extended to people who lived in the immediate area of Trinity, it actually is all encompassing of our state.

And the reason for that is because the Trinity bomb affected the entire state of New Mexico.

>> Nash: Okay.

And, the Trinity test happened 80 years ago.

Exactly.

Basically this week, you have been fighting to have New Mexicans included in RECA for decades now.

You yourself are a cancer survivor, having grown up in Tularosa, New Mexico What would you like to share about how you got to this point?

>> Cordova: Well, this is my lif and there came a point where I knew that I was meant to do this work, and that I would have to dedicate my life to doing it.

I was very naive in the beginning when Fred Tyler and I started the organization.

I really believed that once we made Congress aware of how many people were sick and dying, that they would come back immediately and take care of us.

And that was 20 years ago.

And so, you know, we've been fighting for 20 years to receive acknowledgment for the sacrifice and suffering of the people of New Mexico.

And we've had bills entered in Congress for 15 years.

And last year we came so close.

You know, they passed the bill in the US Senate twice with a very strong bipartisan vote.

But we never could get, Speaker Johnson to clear the way for the bill in the House.

And so it was quite remarkable that we were included now in the reconciliation bill through the efforts primarily of Senator Josh Hawley from Missouri.

>> Nash: What do you think changed?

Why now?

>> Cordova: You know, that's a great question.

The entire congressional delegation that represents New Mexico has made this a huge priority.

They've kept this out there in Congress, in front of everybody, in front of the leadership.

You know, people knew what RECA was.

There was a time when no one knew what RECA was.

I think that Senator Hawley, whose wife, by the way, is from New Mexico, she grew up on a cattle ranch near Des Moines.

I think that Senator Hawley finally saw an avenue to an opportunity and placed this bill inside of a bill, this amendment inside of a bill that he knew would move through, the House rapidly once it passed in the Senate.

It was if you're a policymaker and you're in D.C., it was one of those really genius moves, actually.

>> Nash: This is a huge win for your group that you have been leading for 20 years.

It's been such a long fight.

I wonder, especially with the nature of what you're fighting for.

If there's anybody who's been a part of this fight along with you, who you've lost over the years because of how prolonged this fight is, because of the illnesses that people affected by the Trinity test have endured.

Who you'd like to acknowledge?

>> Cordova: Well, the first person that comes to mind for me is Fred Tyler, who started the organization with me 20 years ago.

Fred never lived to see this happen.

Henry Herrera and his wife, Gloria Herrera, who were some of our first supporters and worked with us so close for so long.

I have three cousins that died in the last two years waiting.

And the list is so long.

I mean, I could go on and on.

There was a woman named Marie Dela Rosa who was one of the very first people that ever contacted me.

She was born the day of the bomb in Carrizozo She was born that morning, and she had so many health problems.

And I used to tell her, it's amazing that you survived because we lost thousands of babies in those months after Trinity.

And so it's people like those.

It's Richard Lopez from Socorro.

He and his wife were our first contact people in Socorro.

And Richard died from lymphoma and worked so closely with us and so diligently to try to get the bill passed.

And we'll never see the success that we've seen.

>> Nash: Let's get into the deta of what it does and doesn't cover what you got that you had fought for and what you didn't get that you wished you could see in the bill.

Let's start with the compensation.

What kind of compensation does it offer people?

>> Cordova: So the original RECA bill only offered $50,000, a one time payment of $50,000.

If you met the you know, the criteria.

The level of compensation has been increased to $100,000.

Now, if you're a uranium worker, you do get health care coverage and you can qualify for up to $400,000 in one time payment of, you know, restitution.

>> Nash: And there's only specific people who qualify for this compensation.

Can you go over that?

>> Cordova: You can apply on behalf of yourself or on behalf of a deceased loved one if they meet the criteria.

You have to prove you lived for at least one year in New Mexico between 1944 and 1962, and you have to have one of what are called the 19 compensable cancers, the cancers that when they started the program, they identified as radiogenic.

So that's basically the criteria you can apply on behalf of a deceased loved one, if they're your child, if it's your parent, if it's your grandparent, you can't apply on behalf of an aunt or an uncle or a cousin or even a brother or sister.

>> Nash: And let's talk about claims process and applying and finding out if you're eligible.

What kind of documentation do people need to have available and what barriers?

I mean, I could imagine there's going to be some barriers to proving that your illness was as a result of nuclear weapons testing.

>> Cordova: The program has never been based on proving that the cancer you had was an absolute, or was absolutely caused by radiation exposure.

If you have one of the radiogenic cancers and you lived in one of the downwind areas, the assumption is that that cancer was likely caused by your exposure.

But the things that people are going to need to collect and they can start collecting them now, the claims process has not started.

I want to make sure everybody understands that the Department of Justice is working out details as we speak and will open the claims process eventually, but the types of documentation that people are going to need are things like birth certificates, death certificates, potentially a school record showing that you were living in New Mexico during that time frame.

Medical records.

If you have not secured your medical records, I would advise you to do so.

Those are the sorts of things that people can start working on since now and in some cases, it could be difficult to find those things.

But I've been assured that, you know, agencies are willing to work with people to get those things together.

>> Nash: You mentioned the claim process has not opened yet.

Is there any sense of a timeline?

>> Cordova: We have not seen any kind of timeline indicated yet by the Department of Justice.

But what I can tell you is last week, Senator Luhan, in conjunction with Senator Crapo, who's a Republican from Idaho, they sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi and they said, look, open up the program for the Downwinders in Idaho and New Mexico and Utah and the uranium workers because the program is there.

They're not a new cohort.

You know, we know that you're going to have to construct a new program for the cohort that is those people who live adjacent to nuclear dump sites.

But our folks are not those people.

And so open up the claims process, and we're hoping that the Department of Justice will respond to that in a meaningful and quick way.

>> Nash: On your website, you have a warning for people that there are companies and attorneys that may seem helpful, but are actually potentially predatory in some ways.

Looking to support people in making claims, and then they'll retain some of that compensation.

What advice do you have for people who are potentially eligible for this funding, who are understandably eager to access that compensation?

>> Cordova: Well, we've been saying that everybody needs to be patient just a little bit longer.

The claims process isn't necessarily cumbersome or difficult, and people just need to take a deep breath and be patient until the department, Department of Justice has released the guidelines and says that they're they're open for taking claims.

And you're absolutely right.

If you sign up, especially if you sign up prematurely with some of these out-of-state organizations that are now in New Mexico soliciting us, if you sign up with one of them and they file a claim on your behalf, they're entitled to a fee for that.

The check goes to them.

They deduct their fee, and then eventually they drive a check to you.

And we're just telling everybody, look, we're going to find people.

People are coming forward to volunteer.

We're going to find people that we can train, that we can put in communities all across New Mexico where you can go and get the assistance that you need.

You do not need an attorney, and you do not need an outside organization to do this for you.

And so we're just warning people don't turn over documentation.

I've heard that that's already happened.

Don't turn over documentation.

Sit still.

Go to our website, which is Trinity downwinders.com and look for updates.

We will keep people updated the minute we hear that it's time to file claims, or the minute that we have established volunteers, that will all be listed there.

Trinitydownwinders.com.

>> Nash: And while this is a huge win, you didn't get everything that you wished to see in the reauthorized RECA.

That includes that it's only been reauthorized for two years.

What else would you have liked to have seen in there?

What will you keep fighting for?

>> Cordova: Well, we're going to take this win and this open door, and we're going to walk through and ask for more.

That's the bottom line.

We want health care coverage.

That's the most meaningful thing for people who live in rural parts of New Mexico, especially now when we don't know what's going to happen with Medicaid.

We've been collecting health surveys for 18 years now, and we ask the question on the health surveys, and we have, oh, gosh, well over 1500 of them where people have voluntarily, come forward and shared with us.

And we ask the question, inevitably, people state that when they can no longer work and they don't have access to private insurance, they access health care through Medicaid.

With the cuts that we understand are going to take place through this reconciliation bill.

We believe that a lot of downwinders and uranium workers are not going to have access to health care coverage.

And so it's, you know, it's vitally important that we go back to Congress and express to them that the health care coverage is very important to us.

They cut it out because they believe it's going to cost a lot of money.

Well, that's a cost.

They've been glad to pass off on us for 80 years.

So we're going to go back for that.

And then we're also going to go back and express to them that a two year extension is nowhere near what we're going to need in New Mexico to get the tens of thousands of people who will qualify enrolled in the program.

There's just no way that's going to happen in two years.

>> Nash: You all have clearly been acknowledging yourselves and each other for decades.

Regardless of whether the federal government or the state government saw you or acknowledged your existence.

But now you do have not only the sign that's being placed this week, but you have Rica that is acknowledging the existence of Downwinders and uranium miners here in New Mexico.

What does it mean to have that acknowledgment now, 80 years after the bomb was detonated?

>> Cordova: Throughout these years of doing this work, so many times, people said to me if they would just apologize and acknowledge what they did to us, that would be good enough.

And I used to say to people all the time, no, that's not good enough.

They need to take care of us like they have done for other people.

But it's amazing.

Over the last week, the acknowledgment has become so important to me.

I think there were many times when I said to myself, they will acknowledge us.

I will continue to do this until the day they acknowledge us.

And now that we're there, that acknowledgment has become so important.

Tina Cordova, thank you so much for your time.

Thank you.

Nash.

It was a pleasure to be here.

>> The place that is open to our community where children like adults, elders, people, you know, can come together to share knowledge, to work together to grow food.

And then that food is redistributed back into the community itself.

In that case, like I would say, like in, like ten, 20, 30 years from now, however long you want to think about it like this is a thriving place that's really continuing to to be in connection with the community.

>> Nash: Our latest episode of Indigenously Positive is coming up in about half an hour.

Green energy jobs will take a hit with Trump spending bill as renewable energy projects get pushed aside to make room for more tax incentives for oil and gas companies.

With New Mexico being the second largest oil producer in the country.

We reached out to oil and gas reporter Jerry Redfern to break down what those changes could mean for our state.

In a collaboration with nonprofit news organization Capital and Maine Jerry stopped by our studio to interview Kyle Tisdel, senior attorney with the Western Environmental Law Center.

The two examine the big bill and how it fits in with Trump's executive orders to roll back federal regulations on an industry that was already receiving minimal oversight.

>> Redfern: Hey, Kyle, thanks for joining us today.

>> Tisdel: Yeah.

My pleasure.

Thanks for having me, Jerry.

Yeah.

>> Redfern: So the president's big beautiful bill spends an awful lot of language and a lot of time talking about oil and gas regulations in Alaska and offshore drilling.

What is in it that actually pertains directly to how oil and gas operations work in New Mexico?

>> Tisdel: Yeah, it's a it's a great question.

And I think to sort of start that, Jerry, we should maybe start with the beginning of the Trump administration.

And on day one.

You know, there's a series of executive orders and energy emergencies that are being declared.

And what that did was sort of set this policy agenda for energy dominance.

Right.

And, and the notion of that is that we are going to prioritize oil and gas extraction above other uses of our public lands and resources.

And so what the bill does is essentially, change the fundamental structure of how our lands are managed for fossil fuel extraction.

One where for the last 50 years we have, balanced, or endeavored to balance, a variety of uses, including oil and gas, but things like timber and water and recreational values and scenic values on our public lands.

And what the bill does is it prioritizes and elevates oil and gas above those other uses.

And of course, New Mexico has about 42 million acres of public lands that are open to mineral extraction.

So it basically gives industry a blank check to say which of those 42 million acres they want to lease and develop.

And it removes the discretion from the agency to tell them no, to tell them that we're going to prioritize other uses.

It's also important to note that there are things called split estate lands right?

And so this is particularly important for our farmers and ranchers who might own the surface estate, but it's managed by BLM in terms of the minerals underneath of it.

And and the bill eliminates, the consultation requirement for industry to reach out or for BLM to reach out to landowners and say, “Hey, this is a use of, of your surface estate that we want to use for oil and gas” And it eliminates the ability for BLM to say no to that.

>> Redfern: So jumping back to the first part of your answer there, are you saying these executive orders sort of working hand in glove with the big beautiful bill, are they really two parts of the same thing?

And second, sort of follow up question there, what is the energy emergency exactly?

>> Tisdel: So yeah, you know, the Trump administration set this sort of energy dominance agenda, from day one.

And what we're seeing now is the implementation of that agenda through a lot of different ways.

The big beautiful bill is the sort of congressional implementation.

It does a lot of things, right, that are probably a lot of awful things.

But when it comes to the energy component of that, it really does aim to implement and fulfill the wish list of the oil and gas industry.

For everything that they've been wanting to do for a long time, which is again, remove the agency's discretion to limit oil and gas on public lands and give industry, the unfettered ability to access our public lands.

And and it does so as well in a way that it even strips the agency of the ability, their ability to implement sort of stipulations or mitigation measures to make oil and gas less harmful on our public lands.

The bill even strips out those types of minimal protections on our public lands, and really answers that question.

The energy emergency, as far as I can tell, is something entirely contrived by the Trump administration to prioritize fossil fuel exploitation on our public lands.

And it does so in a way that both then puts its thumb on the scale of oil and gas, but it makes it harder to develop renewable resources on our public lands.

And it also even does things like prioritize coal extraction, so that those that coal can be shipped to foreign markets.

So, you know, if there's truly an energy emergency, you would think, well, this is like an all of the above sort of strategy.

We need to sort of unleash American energy.

But what it aims to do actually, is unleash a certain type of American energy, in a way that will take public goods, resources, minerals, and allow those to be privatized for private profit by big oil.

>> Redfern: You brought up removing a lot of regulations and rules, and that's been a huge part of the the president's whole agenda going forward.

But another part of that agenda was this whole DOGE agency, the, you know, Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency.

And what that's been doing is removing people, you know, so you get rid of regulations and then you're getting rid of people as well who would be enforcing regulations that remain theoretically.

I'm wondering if in your work you've come across the lack of people in places like, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Bureau of Land Management, other agencies within, the Department of Interior.

How have you seen that so far?

>> Tisdel: Yeah, I mean I think what we've all seen from from DOGE in those efforts is sheer chaos at the federal level in terms of, you know, the firing of federal employees and then the rehiring them and freezes by the courts, right?

But what it has done, I think, more than anything, is, is a couple different things.

One is that it has eliminated key positions within our agencies.

And these are individuals who are career employees and who have particular expertise, whether that be a particular species or segment of stream, that you know, that biologists might be responsible for tracking and managing.

Or they have particular expertise on, you know, the regulation of oil and gas and the technologies and techniques that industry employs.

And, you know, we are seeing sort of this, loss of capacity at, within our agencies.

And sometimes those folks are are very critical to fulfilling that oversight and management mission, that our agencies are intended to employ.

You know, the other sort of element of this is we are losing then, you know, a lot of these career employees.

But, you know, who are we left with?

Is the other question.

And, you know, I wouldn't want to ever disparage, you know, the hard working career employees that we have.

But the folks that do tend to stick around are those that, are aligned with the president's agenda in terms of how our public lands should be managed.

And so you also are seeing not only the loss of critical employees, but I think also this culture shift within the agencies and the loss of maybe, unbiased, you know, folks within our agencies to, to something that's maybe a little bit more aligned with the priorities of the administration.

>> Redfern: You know, so this makes me wonder you know, the feds aren't the only people out there doing enforcement and regulation.

The state has a large role in this as well.

Do you think that the state of New Mexico and its agencies have the ability to pick up the slack where the federal government is laying off?

Are there enough people?

Do they have the budgets to do this?

>> Tisdel: Yeah, we have wonderful people at the state, you know, the oil conservation division in the state.

We work fairly closely with them on several initiatives.

They are good, smart people, but they are also inherently understaffed and lacking capacity.

So, you know, there is also very distinctive missions between you know, an agency like the oil conservation Division and the responsibilities of our federal government in the management of our federal public lands.

Certainly there is overlap.

But in terms of you know, analyzing the impacts the environmental or community or cultural impacts of oil and gas extraction on our public lands, you know, the oil conservation division is not asked necessarily with doing that level of analysis or review of of oil and gas.

So I do agree, Jerry, there is a large and significant role for states, including New Mexico, to play, to sort of fill with some of the gaps.

But the missions and the directives are distinctive.

>> Redfern: That also makes me think along these same sort of lines there's a huge amount of funding that's being cut by the federal government to states in all sorts of different directions.

And you know, a sizable portion of both the oil conservation division budget, the Environment department budget, they rely on federal funds to hire people in various capacities.

So do you see that having a knock on effect as well?

>> Tisdel: Certainly.

I mean, I think there are certain, you know, funding streams that have, you know, for, you know, oil and gas, well, clean up, for example, that, there's a large amount of money coming from the federal government, two states, including New Mexico, to clean up, really an epidemic of orphaned wells in the state.

Thus far, that money hasn't sort of stopped flowing, but it certainly is at risk of doing so.

And a lot of the initiatives for things like environmental justice or outreach to communities or engagement with frontline communities on, really critical issues, that money has dried up and we have seen sort of a pretty dramatic, you know, pull back in terms of, you know, the federal government reaching out and engaging with communities.

So all of that money has already been pulled away.

>> Redfern: Remarkable.

So, another thing I'm wondering about here is dealing with you and what you've done for years and what the Western Environmental Law Center does.

I mean, you're a law center.

You're a lawyer, a large part of what you do is sue the federal government on environmental grounds, personal health grounds to to keep the place cleaner.

That's kind of what that's kind of your job.

How do you see things changing at a Justice Department that has been seemingly weaponized against those particular ideas?

Are you already seeing the effects of that?

Are you already seeing the effects of, you know, lack of people at the Justice Department or people who have been brought in specifically to fight against these sorts of topics?

Yeah, I mean, we've we're certainly seeing that in both, staffing capacity and, you know, the position that the federal government takes on certain matters and litigation.

You know, we certainly see a shift from the position maybe that they took during the Biden administration and sort of shifting course during, you know, now, during the Trump 2 administration.

But, Jerry, I think that the real question that I'm sort of grappling with as an attorney and in my capacity right, is, there is a tremendous amount of damage that is being done at multiple levels.

And we've touched on many of those in our conversation today.

But I think the question becomes, how will we emerge from the ruins of the moment that we're in?

And I think that, the reality is, is we won't be able to rebuild a lot of the destruction that is already taken place.

That would take a generation perhaps to rebuild that.

Nor do I think we necessarily would want to, right?

It's not like before the Trump administration, we had, you know, intact ecosystems, and we were addressing the climate crisis with the sense of urgency that we should and we were engaging communities and people like we should have.

And so there's a lot that we already have needed to build upon.

And so, and shift in terms of our approach to address the crises of the moment.

There's a lot of progress that we can make in this moment at the state level in New Mexico.

To help, hold oil and gas industry accountable for, all of the exploitation of New Mexico resources over the years, to clean up after themselves and to really set the course for what, you know, not only responsible oil and gas development looks like.

But really the next stage is how do we transition away from oil and gas as a state?

How do we do that financially?

How do we do that economically?

And that is the overarching question that I think we're asking ourselves in this moment is what can we do?

To really set the course for, the type of future that we want to live into rather than just being so, forlon about the ruins of the moment, >> Redfern: I think on that semi positive note, I think that was a somewhat positive note.

>> Tisdel: I'm trying Jerry.

>> Redfern: Okay.

I think we're going to we're going to wrap it there.

Thank you so much for joining us Kyle.

It's been great.

>> Tisdel: Yeah.

My pleasure Jerry.

>>Nash: Thanks again to Capital and Maine, Jerry Redfern and Kyle Tisdel for that conversation.

Included in Trump's tax and spending bill are cuts to the federal Food Assistance program Snap, known by most as food stamps.

According to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, more than 20% of New Mexicans received some sort of Snap benefits last year.

That's almost twice the national average.

Senior producer Lou DiVizio recently sat down with Republican State Senator Jim Townsend for a long discussion on this and other changes coming from the big bill for his constituents in Eddy and Otero counties and around the state.

>> Lou: State Senator Jim Townsend, thanks so much for joining me on New Mexico in Focus.

>> Townsend: Thank you, Lou.

>> Lou: This week we're hearing from different organizations, different journalists, covering the impact of the federal spending bill passed earlier this month.

What are your big takeaways from that bill and how will how it will impact New Mexico and your constituents in Eddy and Otero counties?

>> Townsend: Well, I think there█s many more positives than negatives.

You know, if you look through the bill today, you see that the working class is being afforded tax relief.

You have people that are making between 15 and 30,000 are having taxes reduced by 23%.

You're having those in the 30 to 40,000 range being reduced by 18%.

And those, from 40 to 50 are having a reduction, about 16%.

And so and you are seeing those that are high wage earners, over $1 million that are seeing their taxes reduced by about 8%.

So everyone is getting tax relief on top of that.

Probably one of the most significant issues in my district is border security.

Just the impacts of of what had occurred on the southern border has really been stressful to a lot of southern New Mexico communities.

>> Lou: I want to get to some specific issues within the bill, including those tax cuts also.

But I want to start with Medicaid.

More than a third of the state's population will lose coverage or receive less coverage under this bill.

People are still going to need medical services.

Who should cover the costs?

If some New Mexicans aren't able to pay for themselves?

>> Townsend: Well, I think, I think that you hit at a core point, of why people are supportive of the bill.

They believe that Medicaid and Medicare should be protected for those that desperately need those services.

>> Lou: Have you heard from any constituents who are worried that they who legitimately do receive benefits might get caught up in this and lose their coverage?

And what do you say to them?

>> Townsend: Yeah, I have Lou and I have told them, most of those that I have talked to have been, subjected to a lot of what I call fearmongering.

I mean, people have made all wise you know, accusations and assumptions and quite frankly, the bill is passed, and I don't know anybody that knows the full impact of the bill because New Mexico and legislators and New Mexico, Republican and Democrat alike, are focused on making sure that we protect those New Mexicans that deserve care, have it coming.

And if we have to, you'll see New Mexico dollars backfilling in to help protect those.

>> Lou: Now, another piece of this Medicaid equation is rural hospitals.

You, of course, are in Eddy and Otero counties.

They're going to have to shoulder a larger financial burden under this bill because of higher number of patients in those areas generally are on Medicaid.

Have you heard from hospital leaders or citizens in your area that are concerned about the viability of these hospitals moving forward now?

>> Townsend: You bet.

Now, I will tell you that today, according to our Secretary of Health, she told us, in the last meeting that there were, about eight rural hospital in New Mexico that were on the verge of bankruptcy today.

They're on the verge of bankruptcy today, and that's because of historical problems.

>> Lou: Speaking about this bill specifically, does this bill make that problem better or worse?

>> Townsend: This is not a magic wand for rural hospitals, because rural hospitals are under a ton of stress today.

And and we have rural communities that deserve good hospitals.

You are correct.

I have talked to rural hospitals.

I talked to my CEO, at our hospital.

I talked to hospitals in Roswell.

They are under stress and and they're looking to legislators to help address it.

>> Lou: Now, the state legislature, which of course, you're a part of, raised Medicaid reimbursement rates in 2023.

Senate Republicans added, a fund, $50 billion at the federal level to support some rural hospitals, but that, by all financial estimates, falls short of offsetting the cuts that these hospitals will face.

What can the state legislature do now to keep those hospitals from closing or eliminating vital services like prenatal care?

risk off of hospitals and to get it off the doctors.

We're going to have to help clean up our tax, our rolls, so that those that are due care are secure in their care.

I think, there's going to have to be some restrictions and maybe some co-pays.

I mean, people are going to have to have some skin in the game and quit gone to the ERs for anything and everything.

We're going to have to get more focused on and help people and incentivize people to take better care of themselves.

We know we have rural hospitals that are under stress today.

About eight of them are fixing to go broke.

If we don't do something, we put the stresses of this, this new bill on top of that, the uncertainty of it.

I think it's going to cost New Mexico, some money in order to address those issues.

>>Lou: In your words.

We should incentivize people to not go to the hospital all the time and be healthier.

I think be healthier is what you said.

>> Townsend: not go to the hospital, we're not trying to keep people from going to the hospital when they need to, but the emergency rooms have become the the doctor office.

Instead of going to the general practitioner, they just go to the emergency room because it doesn't cost anything.

>> Lou: Could that be attributed to the fact that health care is so expensive in every other way that people feel forced there?

>>Townsend: I think you can't ignore the fact that that's a that certainly is a possibility.

The other thing that you have to acknowledge is a lot of these communities are very different.

We have, we have some communities that█s really good, hospitals and adequate, number of doctors.

We have other communities that, hospitals are far away and they have, less medical services.

And so we're going to have to address this.

>> Lou: Moving on to food assistance, snap as it█s known, food stamps.

Also, there are new work requirements under this bill, which will inevitably lower the number of people who are eligible.

But by all accounts and projections, it will also lower the number of people who are eligible from the program to just through the red tape that they have to jump through.

What will that mean for your district specifically?

>>Townsend: I know that's a narrative that's out there, Lou, about, a lot more red tape, I think The fact of the matter is there are, there are two qualifying times a year.

So every six months people have to requalify or resubmit.

Information in order to stay on the program.

We have gotten so laser focused in New Mexico on expediting care that we, quite frankly, have, by the by our own records, our error rate has gone from the 3 to 4% range to, you know, 15% range.

So I desperately want to make sure that people that need care have it.

If they're able bodied, they are they they ought to get up and go to work.

And we ought to help them with a hand up, not a handout as in any business or in any family.

When you have to tighten up and fly, ride it, you have to go through some painful process system.

Unfortunately, I think we're there right now, but we'll get through it.

>> Lou: Senator, these there are well-documented studies that show that people who have stable housing, stable access to food are significantly more likely to keep a job because their situation isn't so unsteady.

And you mentioned hand ups versus handouts.

What would a hand up look like if it's not providing access to to food for people who need it and people even who aren't at the bottom of the level?

I know you're saying that people right now are getting it who don't need it, but there are folks in the middle there who are going to get cut out, under this bill by all estimations.

>> Townsend: You know, there may that does not prevent the state from stepping in and helping to backfilled that as I think we should.

To a certain extent.

But it's not a question of whether we're going to have to make adjustments.

We're spending more money than we're taking in.

I mean, we that we we actually I mean, we're we're either going to make these adjustments willingly or it's going to be really hard in the near future because we're going to have to make cuts because we don't have any money.

>>Lou: Now, I want to go to your position, you're a member of the state Senate interim federal funding stabilization, subcommittee.

What conversations has that group had in in regards to these issues that I've brought up?

Snap, which you said that you guys would step up on Medicaid backfilling, you say, are these conversations ongoing?

>>Townsend: They are.

We just had a meeting.

week before last in Santa Fe.

We have another one in Taos.

In a couple of weeks.

We are focused on getting some recommendations back to, let's see, by the end of the year.

So when we go into the next legislative session, they have our input.

Again, I don't think it's I don't think addressing the needs of New Mexicans as a partisan issue.

We're trying our very best to figure out exactly what the impacts are, really.

The CBO doesn't do dynamic scoring neither does, the New Mexico Senate or House.

I think there's going to be some benefits as well.

That's what I'm trying to say.

>>Lou: I do have the estimation from the CBO for this budget puts it at increasing the federal defecit by 3.4 trillion.

Now, as you say, those don't always pan out, but the CBO does average around a 6% error rate in deficit projections a decade away.

So that still puts it in the ballpark of the upper 2 trillion lower 3 trillion dollars.

Are you worried about that as a fiscal conservative, that those tax cuts, to everybody, as you say, but the vast majority of which will be for the wealthiest Americans.

Are you worried at all about the deficit that that in all estimations will create?

>>Townsend: Absolutely.

I mean, I worry about it at the state level.

I worry at about it at the towns and household level.

I mean, deficits aren't good and none of us can continue to operate in that, manner.

>> Lou: Now, I want to move to oil and gas.

Oil and gas production obviously is a major economic driver in your district.

What does this bill do for your area when it comes to that industry?

>>Townsend: For the most part, I been viewed as being positive.

There's a long list of oil and gas companies and energy companies that support it.

I think what you're going to see is you're going to see energy companies not just oil and gas, but energy companies that are able to be self-sufficient and promote a project or a production.

That is self-sufficient and doesn't need, subsidies.

You're going to see them flourish.

You're going to see them rise and go real strong.

>>Lou: The bill also lowers royalty rates, which means that the state is going to collect a lower percentage on oil and gas produced here.

Is that a concern for you at all when it comes to the building our revenue as a state?

>> Townsend: I'm not for sure that I agree with that statement as it lowers the royalty rates we raise those in New Mexico but even with that said, >> Lou: it's lowered down to 12 under this bill.

>> Townsend: I think, royalty rates, being reduced is an issue.

I'll have to look at that.

I'm going to be real honest I'm going to have to look at that before I comment on it, because, I read it differently, but that doesn't mean I'm right.

>>Lou: You, of course, are a Republican in a Republican district, in a Democratic state.

What's it like for you?

I've seen you on different media outlets.

being a state Republican having to speak to federal policy from the GOP, is that is that, difficult for you, given that you aren't directly part of the negotiations around bills like this?

>>Townsend: It isn't for me.

I mean, I serve as the national committee under the RNC from New Mexico.

I attend RNC meetings.

It's frustrating to me that sometimes that in my opinion, we do things that harm New Mexicans.

And that really causes me, a lot of problems, because I think our job is legislators is to make everybody's life a better life, regardless of whether they're Republicans or Democrats.

I want New Mexico and New Mexico families to flourish.

>>Lou: Senator Jim Townsend, thank you so much for being here on New Mexico in Focus.

>>Townsend: Thank you sir.

Thanks, Lou.

>>Nash: We appreciate State Senator Townsend taking the time to lay out his perspective on what Trump's tax and spending bill means for New Mexico.

Now we move to the latest installment of Indigenously Positive, our collaboration with nonprofit newsroom New Mexico In Depth.

This time, correspondent Bella Davis takes us to a small patch of land north of Albuquerque where red onions, carrots, blue corn and more are rising from the ground.

Welcome to the indigenous farm hub in Corrales, where Bella spotlights the deeply rooted significance of food sovereignty.

[Indistinct Chattering] >>Bella: Just north of Albuquerque, farmers are getting veggies ready to be delivered to local families.

This is the indigenous farm hub.

On top of growing a whole lot of food.

The folks at the hub work with schools to bring students out to connect with the land, and they support native and non-native farmers through paid fellowships.

>>Bobroff: Looking at it like a place that is open to our community where children like adults, elders, people, you know, can come together to share knowledge, to work together to grow food.

And then that food is redistributed back into the community itself.

In that case, I would say, in like 10, 20, 30 years from now, however long you want to think about it like this is a thriving place that's really continuing to to be in connection with the community and, generations of folks can know that, that it's here and then that continues to thrive.

To me that's like what indigenou food sovereignty means.

It's not a when it's not is like saying like, oh, we're just going to do this for ourselves.

Like we're doing this for everybody.

What we're doing is, we just watched we watched our carrots and, now we're bagging and we're going into bagging.

>>Mahkee: You see the end product you know from the beginning plowing, all that planting, and then here after everything is washed and bagged it's going to go out to feed families.

>>Nichols: We always try to bag for a family of four and then think about what they could possibly be making.

So this is the most special part to us.

>>Lopez: It's always good like to engage the kids like the interns that come out.

And then the farmer residents get to see, like what is possible for them and what is possible for them to create in their communities as well.

So actually understanding and building our relationship to our food source again, which was severed before.

And that's like important, vital especially for like the youth that, have been disconnected and disturbed from that.

And I myself too.

Right.

I'm coming back into it, like, in the sense of the remembrance phase of remembering what it is to have our connection to our food source.

Again.

When our young people come out in March, we show them how do you start by preparing the soil digging the ditch, the furrow.

And then cutting the potatoes down to the size that it needs to be.

And then you literally plant that and set up our irrigation together.

And during that whole process, we make reference to, you know, where potatoes are from originally.

They're not from my people in Ireland.

But we enjoy them.

But they're from Peru.

And that's inherently an indigenous food that is across the world now and then to 2 or 3 months later, they'll come back as in right now, and they'll help us dig out the potatoes like the interns have done.

And then we are able to get those onto the plates of our families that go to our schools.

And I think that is like the beautiful thing that we root, not just the learning experiences, but the value, the value that living on the land that, you receive when you actually know what it takes to plant a potato and dig that sucker out of the ground, it has to taste better than if you didn't do that.

And to see our students, like, light up when they see that whole process, that whole continuum is really what we want to do.

The Native American Community Academy is one of the local schools the farm works with.

To get kids from kindergarten all the way through high school, out to the farm to do what's called land based learning.

>> Kwon: You're decolonizing the education by bringing it back to what your communities have always known.

I remember we brought a group of, I want to say, fourth or fifth graders, within the last several school years.

They just absolutely love going out into the plant and seeing all the different kind of bugs.

I remember one day they were just so enthralled with all the ladybugs.

And so they were counting them and trying to see who could find the most.

And, reading back through the little notes that they're taking, so many of them write, like how peaceful they feel, how strong they feel, how much braver they are.

Just really, really cool, insightful things that show when they're here, they just start calming down and they start feeling really capable, and they start feeling really helpful, and they start feeling like they're really working in community and while also getting to know themselves better, too.

>>Martine: We pick food and I know that they're going to families that need it.

A lot of the time when, we pick food at the schools, it's just a lot of extra food that we were able to just give out to people.

So I think that's, just really important since, like, myself and my family, we had a hard time getting food.

So it's just really nice that I get to be able to do that for other people.

Now that I'm older.

We did do some gardening when I was little, like in our back yard and stuff like that.

We grew a lot of, like squash and corn, and when I got a little older, when I got to Naka, when I was going to school there, they did try to start gardens.

So we did do a lot of that.

But it never really, like, took off the way it is now.

>>Brauer: We're in the blue corn which last year was sunflowers and pumpkins and squash.

This year it's corn.

Behind you.

That field was in fallow, so we let that sit for a couple of years.

A lot of this land, by and large, was corn for about 30 years prior to when we started growing it, growing here for, four years ago.

Four seasons ago.

And so we've let some of the land rest.

But what we do, we, we try to use good practices around regenerative, sustainable, approaches to the agriculture, which are the new terms that are just the way that things were done here with, the ancestors of this land and the current people who do, inhabit this area.

>>Bella: The farm hub has been a dream for the past couple decades.

Kara was the founding principle of the Native American Community Academy.

Just before I got started, there were a lot of community conversations about what improving education for native children could look like.

One of the things that kept coming back up was growing food.

>>Kara: There's a lot of challenges and obstacles to getting healthy food to to our school and to many schools.

But when, the pandemic hit, kind of like that resurfaced in the areas that we worked at, with, like tribal communities and other folks saying like, hey, like we're having food delivered to our communities.

But we've been farming for generations.

And how do we get back to that?

So it's kind of reconnection for sure.

Back to when I farmed one season at the guidance of Alan and then also this like now larger team.

And it's really a place that people can show up, like put in some time and connect and it's like really but been both educational and a really beautiful way to actually have your hands, like back in the dirt.

And also eating what you grow.

I don't know if you can catch that, that sound.

>>Brauer: that sound, that corn, blue corn blowing in the wind.

Even though I'm not from New Mexico, I've.

I've worked with my fiancé to become a lot better at making my own fresh tortillas.

And so being able to like next, nixtamalize our corn, grind it down, and make fresh tortillas.

I'm real proud of that.

>>Kara: Once the blue corn is kind of like it's ground up and I'm putting that into like whether it's a like, you know, lukewarm mush, like that's a special, special thing.

>>Nash: Thank you To Bella Davis NMPBS producer Benjamin Yazza, photojournalist Joey Dunn and RJ Torres, and everyone else who contributed to this week's show.

Make sure to join us next week as we take you to Ruidoso, a community that's been hit yet again with devastating flooding following last summer's fires.

For New Mexico PBS, I'm Nash Jones.

Until next week, stay focused.

Funding for New Mexico in Focus is provided by viewers like you.