New Mexico State Senator Dede Feldman's Blog

Straight from Source NM: Dede's article on the 2022 legislative session--The games people play

 The Games People Play

Calls of the Senate, filibusters and other delaying tactics

from Source New Mexico, Feb. 22, 2022

Last week’s frustrating end to this year’s legislative session left election reformers, voting rights advocates and others wondering: how could this happen? 

How could one senator filibuster for over two hours, killing arguably one of the most important bills of the session: the New Mexico Voting Rights Act? And how, days earlier, could Republicans — the minority in the Legislature today — issue a “call of the Senate,” blocking all discussion of the same issue?

How a call works

A call of the Senate or the House requires the presence of all unexcused members of either chamber. It can be issued by any member but requires the votes of six other members. 

The sergeant-at-arms,sometimes backed up by the State Police, is then charged by the presiding officer to round up the missing members — from their offices, nearby restaurants or homes. The doors are locked, and the remaining members are not permitted off the floor. The call is “complete” only after all are present. 

It’s easy to see how a handful of legislators in either chamber can stop debate indefinitely on any bill. The logjam is usually cleared by an agreement to remove the call — in return for something else. Or not.

At a time of deep partisan divide, either political party could theoretically put a call on every bill if they had the votes of a mere seven members. That has not yet happened, but the mechanism has been misused in the past, revealing not just run-of-the-mill political maneuverings but some seedy behavior as well.  

One call of the House that I remember in 2004 involved renegade Rep. Bengie Regensberg, the black-hatted cowboy from Wagon Mound who promoted cock-fighting and had a reputation for feisty confrontations. Regensberg was absent from a late-night call of the House, and Speaker Ben Luján sent the State Police to find him. 

Officers finally found him at his motel. The lawmaker proceeded to get into a fist fight with the State Police, according to reports.  He came back with a black eye.

Months later, he got a surprise challenge in his Democratic primary — newcomer Hector Balderas, who today is New Mexico’s attorney general. 

During the 1990s, Sen. Tom Benavides from the South Valley of Albuquerque was notorious for eluding capture during calls of the Senate. Benavides was best known for his black eye patch — a distinguishing feature you might think would make him easy to find when looking for errant senators. 

Not so. During one call, Benavides successfully hid under his desk. During another he donned a black wig and sunglasses and disguised himself as a woman. As police mounted a manhunt, “Mrs. Benavides” sat quietly (accounts vary as to whether she was on the dais or in the gallery) while senators fumed, only to erupt in laughter when Benavides shed his wig and sunglasses and they realized he had been there the whole time. 

Benavides was so slippery that in 1995 Lt. Gov. Walter Bradley had him followed by two burly State Police officers the last two days of the session. President Pro Tem Manny Aragon even presented him with a gag gift of handcuffs, to make sure that policemen could keep him locked to his Senate chair. 

He was defeated by Sen. Linda Lopez in 1996.

 

Republican filibusters also have a long history in the N.M. Legislature. Mostly reserved for the final days of unreasonably short sessions, they are effective for Republicans who believe that their main job is to thwart the majority and prevent new laws, government regulations or taxes. 

Republicans introduce far fewer bills and have less to lose in any delay, and so the filibuster is not just reserved for the final days but, as observers know, rolls on cumulatively during committee hearings, and even during announcements and miscellaneous — a nebulous time on the floor when in the Senate, the two-hour limit on debate does not apply. 

In 1997, my first year in the Senate, I was stunned by the last-day filibuster of Sen. Bill Davis, which brought down the capital outlay bill, as well as a private prison deal. Later I became more callous, if no less resentful, when in 2011 a $240 million capital outlay bill languished as Sen. Rod Adair and Sen. John Ryan engaged in what was called a “Laurel and Hardy” routine by then-Senate Majority Leader Michael Sanchez. 

At the turn of this millennia in the Senate, other fun and games included demands from either Davis (R-Albuquerque) or Sen. Ramsay Gorham (R-Albuquerque) that the entirety of a bill actually be read on “the third reading of legislation,” a parliamentary term for the time when debate begins on each bill.  The tactic was particularly effective when facing debate on, say, a 560-page bill. 

For years, defenders of these time-wasters have said these games are a way to prevent the majority from trampling on the rights of the minority. It’s true, but the damages can’t be denied. 

At the national level, Senate filibusters have historically allowed the denial of voting rights, prolonging the Jim Crow era. It’s why there is now a national movement to end Senate filibusters, especially as applied to essential components of our democratic system — like voting rights.  

It’s time to revise the rules here in New Mexico, too. Elections and voting rights are not a game to be played by obstructionists donning black wigs or telling folksy tales.

Filibusters would be far less effective in longer sessions.

Calls of the Senate or House should take into account Zoom and other technologies to allow members to participate remotely, as COVID has already taught us. 

And maybe, a professional paid Legislature, with regular hours, and fewer reasons for citizen legislators to be absent from their main job — lawmaking — would cut down on the fun and games.  ###

Ten More Doors Excerpt in Jemez Springs Newspaper

Here's an excerpt from my memoir Ten More Doors: Politics and the Path to Change shared here in advance of a Book Talk I"m giving Saturday Feb. 5 at 2 via zoom for the Jemez Springs Library. Join at https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82911494023 Mtg Id= 829 1149 4023; Passcode=Dede. 

I'll explain then: 

From Chapter 9: At Street Level

I walked by the house on Matthew Avenue today. It just didn’t look the same. The run-down old garage is now attached to the house, and a uniform plaster has been applied to the crumbling white façade that had confronted me, a wannabe senator, in 1996. I was knocking on doors in the neighborhood in search of votes.

I knocked on the door and mentally (and okay, maybe even verbally) practiced my pitch before someone answered the doorbell. “Hi, I’m Dede Feldman. I’m running for office— for the state senate—and I wondered if you had any concerns about the state?”

No answer. I rang again. I knocked. I was preparing to leave and put my “literature” in the door when I heard a voice.

“Running for office? Any concerns?”

It was a strange voice, a spooky, hoarse voice. It was coming from somewhere, but I couldn’t figure out where.

“Hello?” I yelled. “Hello?” it yelled back.

This was truly weird. It seemed to be coming from the garage, off to the side.

Time to leave, I thought, but then it said, “Running for office? Any concerns?”

Oh no, no, no—I’m out of here, I thought, just as a weathered looking man with Depression-era eyes and a gentle face opened the door.

“Yes?” he asked, squinting into the sun, his dirty hair in his eyes. He looked like he had just woken up.

As I started in on my pitch, I heard it again. “Any concerns?” “I was just about to ask...”
“Any concerns?”

I recognized the voice now. It was the man at the door’s. But his lips weren’t moving.

Suddenly the homeowner’s sad expression broke into a broad grin.

“Oh, that’s Marvin,” he said. “He’s my pet raven. They talk, you know. I trained him to say a few words, but he knows more. Learns ‘em from people who come to the door unexpectedly.”

We laughed and he offered to introduce me to the raven.

He led me to the garage and opened the door. I looked around. All sorts of hunting equipment was strewn about, fishing tackle piled in the corner, and construction debris everywhere. In the middle there was a covered cage with something moving inside it.

It was Marvin, and as soon as the cover was removed, he cracked opened his thick bill and croaked, “Any concerns?”

The bird was massive, with scruffy feathers that looked eaten. Maybe he had just been in a fight. He was iridescent, his feathers almost blue, and he had dark, dark eyes and talons that gave me pause.

It was my first encounter with someone who kept a wild animal as a pet. The raven had fown away twice, come back once, and the second time the man at the door searched for the bird day and night. He finally found Marvin in a tree in the South Valley. The raven recognized his call.

I’d never thought of animals as being part of my constituency, except maybe in the abstract. But things were beginning to add up in my semi-rural, semi-urban district in Albuquerque’s North Valley.

Sure, I’d encountered dogs. Pee Wee, Esse, JoJo, Buster, and Cholo had greeted me at the door on almost every street I walked. I’d been bitten three times. I carried dog yummies and pepper spray. I learned how to put my foot against the screen door so a German shepherd couldn’t lunge out before I’d had time to deliver my pitch. And I’d spoken over the yaps, the growls, and the barks to owners who said things like, “Skipper would never bite you.”

But ravens? Peacocks? Horses? Donkeys?

 “I want you to think carefully about this,” a stern older woman in the same neighborhood responded when I asked her about her concerns. “See those horses across the street?”

Dutifully, I acknowledged the Appaloosas, the ponies, and yes, even the donkey across the street. They ran in a pack behind the fence at the end of Meadow View Drive. They smelled up the neighborhood.

I loved the Appaloosas, but I shied away from the ponies after one nipped at me.

“Don’t you dare forget about them when you go to Santa Fe,” she said. “That’s why we’re sending you there—to protect them.” I could tell from her blunt gray hair and her relentless eye contact that she meant business.

“Yeah,” I stumbled around, agreeing all up and down, going on about how we need to protect the environment, and the rural character of the area.

She listened politely. She had heard it all before, and it hadn’t made a difference.

I probably couldn’t make a difference either, except at the margins. But the two encounters convinced me to sign up for the Senate Conservation Committee, which focused on wildlife, natural resources, the forest, game, fish, and yes, animal protection. Politically, it was not the best perch for an urban newcomer to the senate. But I never regretted it. I got to vote on saving endangered species, protecting the bosque, and preventing water waste and contamination.

Most of the horses are gone now from the field at the end of my street, and spiffy new houses surround the stables backed up against the ditch. I am afraid to knock on the door of the raven man. He’s probably dead or old, like me.

But at least I know I did my part for my constituents on Matthew Avenue—all of them.