District 4 commission contenders mostly outraising District 2 candidates
May 15—The fundraising frontrunners in two contested races for the Santa Fe County Commission have widened the gap between the most and least well-funded contenders in their latest round of campaign finance reports.
Adam Johnson held onto his lead in a three-way race for the County Commission District 4 seat as of May 6, according to campaign finance reports due Monday. Johnson reported raising more than $35,000 in campaign contributions so far according to state campaign finance records, while Mika Old has raised almost $28,000 and Stephen Chiulli has raised more than $11,000. In District 2, Lisa Cacari Stone has been far outraising her opponents Scott Fuqua and Benito Martinez Jr.
All six of the candidates for the districts 2 and 4 seats are Democrats; with no Republicans running, whoever wins the June 4 Democratic primaries for the two seats will almost certainly be the next commissioner.
The vast majority of contributions to all three candidates have come in individual contributions; Chiulli has also gotten $1,000 from the Plumbers and Steamfitters, UA Local Union No. 412.
Old has received at least $4,000 in contributions from companies connected to Richard Yates, the head of a Santa Fe real estate development company and relative of Republican oil magnate Harvey Yates. The Santa Fe chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, which supports Johnson, has sought to make this an issue and argue that Old is not a real Democrat.
"Old switched parties [six] months ago from Republican to Democrat to sneak into the Santa Fe County Commission," the group said in an Instagram post earlier this week. "But it's not just her party being masked — her donors are too."
Old — who has been open about having changed her party registration from Republican to Democrat in November after becoming disillusioned by the GOP — denounced any characterization of her campaign being "bankrolled" by oil money as "very unfair" and borne out of ignorance.
She attributed her fundraising success to uniting people of "many different backgrounds," including Democrats and Republicans, under her vision for Santa Fe.
The Yates family are longtime family friends, she added. Their donation "had absolutely nothing to do with furthering oil production or fracking in New Mexico." The Democratic Socialists of America, who support Johnson, are "running scared" due to her success, she said.
While Chiulli had spent most of his funds — all but $1,680 — Johnson still had a cash balance of over $20,000 and Old had a cash balance of over $15,000 on hand early this month. All three candidates have spent a few thousand dollars on campaign consultants — approximately $6,500 by Old, $3,900 by Johnson and $2,600 by Chiulli — and otherwise focused most of their spending on campaign literature or paraphernalia.
In the three-way race for the County Commission District 2 seat, Cacari Stone had raised $20,406, more than quadrupling the finances of her nearest opponent Fuqua, who reported $4,250 in contributions. As of Wednesday Martinez had not submitted the most recent campaign finance reports, which were due Monday, according to the New Mexico Secretary of State Office's webpage.
Martinez said Wednesday afternoon his campaign treasurer has been helping his daughter, who just gave birth to her first child, but he planned to file his reports by the end of the day. He said he had met with election officials and expected no ramifications from a late filing. The Secretary of State's webpage listed a fine of $50 against him on Wednesday.
Martinez said he has raised $3,300 so far.
"It's not much compared to my counterpart ... because I'm doing grassroots, total," Martinez said. "It's [about] going in front of the public. I'm knocking on doors at a furious pace."
Fuqua echoed that view in a previous interview with The New Mexican, where he said he dislikes asking for money, and getting in front of voters makes more of a difference than something like distributing mailers, which costs several thousand dollars.
Reports show Fuqua had spent most of his funds as of early this month, with $200 remaining, while Cacari Stone had a cash balance of over $14,600. Cacari Stone had spent a few thousand dollars on campaign paraphernalia while Fuqua had spent about $1,600 on campaign paraphernalia and $1,000 on a campaign consultant.
