Latest news with #SenateBill279
Yahoo
21-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
What happened today at the Roundhouse?
Mar. 20—Some legislative committees are done meeting for this session, while others are scrambling to hear a final list of bills that hope to make it through the floors. Here's a recap of Wednesday and some key bills to watch out for on Thursday, March 20. Gun ban: The Senate Finance Committee has on its schedule Senate Bill 279, a ban on gas-operated semiautomatic firearms and high-capacity magazines, with certain exemptions. Calf Canyon/Hermits Peak Fire: The House Rural Development, Land Grants and Cultural Affairs Committee will hear a memorial, House Memorial 62, in the morning stating the 2022 disaster victims are entitled to full compensation from the federal government.
Yahoo
09-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Gun supporters rally at Roundhouse against proposed restrictions
About 40 gun rights supporters gathered outside of the Roundhouse on a snowy Saturday to express their opposition to gun control measures being considered by the Legislature. Specifically, Senate Bill 279, which would outlaw the sale, transfer and receipt of gas-powered semiautomatic rifles that use high-capacity magazines and ban magazines holding more than 10 rounds. Gun owners who currently own one of the weapons to be restricted would be allowed to keep them but would have to certify them with the state. The bill advanced out of the Senate Judiciary Committee on a 5-4 vote Friday night, along party lines except for Sen. Joe Cervantes, D-Las Cruces, who voted against it. Jared Diesburg was one of the handful who brought with them a semiautomatic firearm that would be implicated under the bill. He said the bill will result in 'mass noncompliance' if it passes. 'if I can jump through federal hoops for some of the things I own, there shouldn't be that many more state hoops that I have to jump through,' he said. The New Mexico Sports Shooting Association and the New Mexico Firearm Industry Association organized Saturday's Second Amendment Rally at the Roundhouse. Matthew Mammoser, deputy director of state affairs for the National Association for Gun Rights called the certification requirement in the bill 'more worrisome' than the restrictions on 'gas-powered firearms.' 'They're going to require everybody with any of those firearms to quote-unquote 'certify' the firearms,' he said. 'They're going to build a registry and throughout human history, when people have to register their weapons, they are confiscated. People with weapons that are not registered do not get filed in cattle cars.' Another attendee, Walter Herrera, questioned whether lawbreakers would comply with the law. ' Who do you think this really impacts? Us law-abiding citizens,' he said. 'Like, do you think violent criminals will listen?' Sen. Crystal Brantley, R-Elephant Butte, was among the Republican lawmakers who spoke at the rally. She is on the Senate Judiciary Committee and voted against the bill. 'I don't care what they pass out of here, it is unlawful. I have no doubt it will be challenged in court, either,' she said. 'It is important, I think, for legislators to be reminded [of] that, whatever moral responsibility that these people think they have in bringing this kind of overreaching policy forward.' She did give credit, though, to Cervantes for breaking with his party. It was one of the few breaks Democrats received at the rally, which saw broad lambasting of the party as being radical, anti-gun extremists. 'We have one simple request for lawmakers and for Governor [Michelle Lujan] Grisham: Leave our rights alone,' said Clay Kimberling, state grassroots coordinator for the National Rifle Association's Institute for Legislative Action. Lujan Grisham was a common target, with one attendee carrying a sign depicting the governor in a Nazi uniform with an Adolf Hitler mustache, a Zia symbol replacing the armband swastika. Lujan Grisham has long been a supporter of gun control, including SB 279, and last year signed a bill putting a seven-day waiting period on gun purchases. The state fights over the issue leapt into national news when she issued an order in 2023 suspending the right to carry firearms in public spaces in Albuquerque and Bernalillo County for 30 days, citing a rise in gun violence. Rep. Stefani Lord, R-Sandia Park, said their fight is 'not necessarily with the governor,' pointing to the decline in the number of conservative Democrats in the Roundhouse over the past few years as they have lost primaries to more progressive challengers. 'The Democrats came out and primaried the people that we had,' she said. 'I loved Willie Madrid, I loved Harry Garcia Democrats. They got rid of them. Now ... these are people that are radicalized to the left, and guess what happens? They never, ever, ever, ever, ever vote with us. It doesn't matter if it's the best bill in the world.' Lord pointed to House Bill 486, a bill she sponsored with Democratic Rep. Anita Gonzales, to require the state Children, Youth and Families Department to do more to ensure a parent has no history of sex crimes before returning a child to the parent's custody. The bill has yet to receive a hearing. 'They love pedophiles!' one person from the crowd yelled. 'They are pedophiles!' jeered another. Lord urged the attendees to seek new Republicans to fit legislative seats, noting it might be a moderate, and that 'we're never going to win with a hard, hard, hard right.' 'I'm horribly outnumbered, and it's not just the gun bills, it's some of the worst woke, woke bills I have ever seen in my life,' she said. She cited House Bill 9, which passed the House on Friday and would lead to the closure of New Mexico's three Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities. 'They want to give the finger to the federal government and see if [President Donald Trump is] going to go ahead and cut off all our Medicaid dollars,' she said. 'And good luck with that when they do.'
Yahoo
21-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Senator calls for ‘civility' after death threat following New Mexico GOP post
Sen. Joseph Cervantes (D-Las Cruces), chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee. Cervantes called on Republicans Thursday Feb. 20, 2025 to denounce a death threat made against him in the comments of a social media posts by NM GOP official accounts. (Photo by Austin Fisher / Source NM) Sen. Joseph Cervantes (D-Las Cruces) on Thursday called for 'civility' and asked Senate Republicans to condemn a death threat against him and the posting of his home address in the comments of an official Republican Party of New Mexico social media post he characterized as 'a falsehood, a lie.' 'I'm a big boy, so I'm used to politics, distortions, lies and mistruths,' Cervantes said on the Senate floor. 'But when it leads to some of the comments that were made on that Republican website that include my home address, GPS coordinates to my home and a suggestion that I'm treasonous and that the penalty for treason is death — it really requires me to stand up and say: Let's work together cooperatively, intelligently and ask you all to denounce that type of rhetoric.' The post in question referred to Senate Bill 279, which would prohibit the importation, sale, manufacture, transfer, receipt or possession of gas-operated semi-automatic firearms, magazines that hold more than 10 rounds, and devices that convert semi-automatic guns into fully automatic ones. Cervantes is not one of the bill's five sponsors. But the bill is assigned to be heard by the Senate Judiciary committee, which Cervantes chairs. On Feb. 18, across social media, the official state Republican party social media accounts posted a graphic with a photo of Cervantes accompanied by text claiming 'Joseph Cervantes (D) plots radical overreach to ban guns' with his office's number and email, and a message to oppose Senate Bill 279, calling it an anti-Second Amendment bill. Minority Floor Leader William Sharer (R-Farmington) responded to Cervantes on the floor and defended the party's post. 'I reject the idea that it was a lie, mostly because the chair of the committee gets to decide what happens in that committee, and certainly we were told that this was getting ready to happen in that committee,' Sharer said on the floor. 'So, while I understand his concern, and I deeply, deeply, deeply do not condone any violence or any threat of violence — for that, I ask whoever's out there doing that: Stop. Stop.' Sharer further asked Cervantes 'for peace, and I will try to avoid being that pointed.' Source NM verified that at least two comments on the social media post characterized the legislation as an 'infringement' on 'our right to bear arms,' before adding that 'violating the Constitution is considered 'Treason' and the maximum 'punishment for treason is death.' Both posts were tagged for possible violations for 'rules against Violent Speech.' In an interview outside his office following his remarks on the floor Cervantes said he has not filed a police report about the death threat and 'probably' doesn't intend to do so because it would give more attention to the person who made the threat, and 'they may get crazier.' 'I've never been about banning guns. I'm a gun owner. I have a concealed carry permit,' he said. 'Any suggestion that I'm working to ban guns is false.' He said the incident doesn't dissuade him at all from hearing SB 279, and he intends to schedule it for a hearing. 'I'd rather downplay it; I think it's been addressed,' Cervantes said. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
