There’s a new report out from the Center for Media and Democracy that reveals the lasting impact of election denial on our state.
The troubling phenomenon is fueled by former President Trump’s continued false claims about the 2020 presidential election, which have already been investigated and debunked by hundreds of researchers, election experts, fact checkers, and courts.
Yet, election denialism and the “Big Lie” appear to have infiltrated and taken over the Republican apparatus in key states, including New Mexico.
We combined CMD’s report with our own disinformation monitoring and came up with over a dozen individuals running for office or in positions of power who have questioned the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election.
Many of these individuals continue to spread conspiracy theories and false information about voting and elections, often driven by their dissatisfaction with election outcomes.
This behavior is alarming in a way that goes beyond the recognizable back and forth of political campaigns. When our leaders perpetuate false claims about election safety/security, it undermines the very foundations of democracy. Voters may begin to question the legitimacy of the process, leading to decreased participation and a sense of powerlessness.
⬇️ Scroll down for a recap of election denial in New Mexico since 2020, plus our list of election deniers who are currently in power or running for office
Aftermath Of The 2020 Election
Following Trump’s loss, New Mexico’s GOP fully embraced the narrative of a stolen election, attempting to impound ballots in Bernalillo County, promoting the fake electors meeting of Republican-appointed electors at the state capitol, and supporting both the Trump campaign’s lawsuit against the NM Secretary of State and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s Texas v. Pennsylvania election lawsuit before the Supreme Court.
New Mexico was one of seven states in which pro-Trump Republicans prepared and submitted fake Electoral College certificates for the 2020 presidential contest, despite Joe Biden winning the state by almost 100,000 votes and the secretary of state’s office certifying the win.
Election denial continued to simmer, including leading into the June 2022 primary, when Otero County commissioners, led by Cowboys for Trump founder Couy Griffin initially refused to certify the results, citing debunked conspiracy theories about voting machines.
Former Sandoval County Commissioner Jay Block, who is closely aligned with Las Cruces-based conspiracy theorists David and Erin Clements, also voted against certifying the 2022 Primary Election and 2022 General Election. In both cases, New Mexico’s Secretary of State and the NM Supreme Court ultimately weighed in, ensuring election results and voters were respected.
Notably, Griffin, who participated in the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capital, did face consequences. He was removed from office by a state judge in September 2022 and barred from holding elected office in the future, a decision later upheld by the US Supreme Court.
Election Deniers Running for Congress
1. Yvette Herrell (NM-CD2) – Herrell is an ultra-MAGA GOP candidate running for the 2nd Congressional District seat, which she held from 2021-23 before losing to Gabe Vasquez. She also held the NM House District 51 seat from 2011-19. One of her first actions as a sitting congresswoman was to object to the certification of the 2020 presidential election results days before the January 6th insurrection, and she also received $2,900 in August 2022 from Deborah Maestas, former NM Republican Party chair and a fake elector who submitted a fraudulent electoral vote. Herrell has advanced baseless claims of voter fraud since at least 2018, and has also spread disinformation about elections/voting via her social media accounts.
Election Deniers Running for NM Legislature
2. John Block (NM House 51) – As one of New Mexico’s highest profile election deniers, Block participated in the march to the Capitol in D.C. on January 6 and posted a photo of the crowd with the message: “The battle has just begun. Stand up and fight like hell, patriots.” He also posted content about the Big Lie, proudly supports the policies of Donald Trump, and has openly advocated for violence toward political opponents. In November 2022, he was elected to represent House District 51 in the New Mexico legislature and is now running for his second term in the 2024 General Election.
3. Jay Block (NM Senate 12) – Block (no relation to John Block), is a current Sandoval County Commissioner who is now running for NM Senate District 12. In 2021, Block attempted to arrange an election audit conducted by the same company that led to voter intimidation in Otero County, in Sandoval County. While the audit did not end up happening, the discussions in the County Commission meetings, led by Block, further spread disinformation about the security of New Mexico elections. He has also aligned himself with MAGA election deniers such as Rep. John Block.
4. Audrey Trujillo (NM Senate 9) – Trujillo is a prominent MAGA Republican who previously ran for House District 23 in 2020, NM Secretary of State in 2022, and is currently running for NM Senate District 9. During the 2022 campaign, she appeared on Steve Bannon’s War Room show, where she uplifted the “Big Lie” that former President Trump won the 2020 election. She also regularly uplifts voting/elections disinformation, and has appeared at events alongside nationally recognized extremists and conspiracy theorists like Mike Lindell, Joe Oltmann and Seth Keshel.
5. Rebecca Dow (NM House 38) – Dow is a former state representative who lost in the GOP primary for governor in 2022. She is now running for NM House District 38, a seat she previously held from 2017-22. As a candidate, she disparaged fellow Republicans for being “never Trumpers” and ran ads to that effect. She has also endorsed 2000 Mules, the widely debunked conspiracy theory film about the 2020 election.
6. Cathrynn Brown (NM House 55) – Brown is running unopposed for re-election to NM House District 55, a seat she has held since 2011. In the early hours of January 6, 2021, Brown announced that she planned to introduce legislation decertifying New Mexico’s five electoral votes for Democrat Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election. She also claimed that final vote tallies had been “manipulated” but offered no evidence of any election fraud.
7. Randall Pettigrew (NM House 61) – Pettigrew is running unopposed for re-election to NM House District 61, a seat he has held since 2021. He posted content after the November 2021 election that questioned the results, including suggesting President Biden couldn’t have won without cheating.
Election Deniers Administering Elections
While county clerks, election staff, and the NM Secretary of State’s Office work to ensure multiple layers of safety/security before, during, and after each election, as we saw in 2022, local elected officials play a role in certifying results.
8. Gerald Matherly (Otero County Commission District 1) – Matherly voted against certifying the county’s primary election results in June 2022, and was also one of three commissioners who had earlier hired a Massachusetts-based marketing firm to conduct a ‘vigilante’ audit of the county’s 2020 presidential election returns, even though Trump won there by a large margin.
9. Vickie Marquardt (Otero County Commission District 3) – Marquardt voted against certifying the county’s primary election results, and was a “hard core” Trump supporter who did not trust the county’s voting machines, according to Reuters. She was also part of the scheme to conduct a vigilante audit.
*Jay Block (Sandoval County Commission District 2) – as previously mentioned, Block is a current Sandoval County Commissioner who is now running for NM Senate District 12. See the “Election Deniers Running for NM Legislature” section for more information.
Election Deniers In GOP Leadership
Leaders in the NM Republican Party have demonstrated significant influence on a range of state GOP legislators/lawmakers, advancing narratives that are then spread at the local level, including the Big Lie.
10. Steve Pearce (Chair of the NM Republican Party) – Steve Pearce is a former congressman who served seven terms in the House (2003–09 and 2011–19), where he was associated with the Tea Party and the House Freedom Caucus. Although his 2018 bid for governor failed, he was elected chair of the state GOP that year and has served in that role ever since. Pearce is known for being instrumental in steering the party towards a more Trumpian brand of politics. Pearce has fully embraced the narrative of a stolen election and has spread misinformation about voter fraud on social media. He has also been involved in efforts to impound ballots and promote fake electors in the state. On January 9, 2021, he tweeted: “God bless President Donald J. Trump. He will be our President FOREVER and no one can take that away from us.”
11. Debbie Weh-Maestas – Weh-Maestas is a former chair of the Republican Party of New Mexico and was one of 5 people named in the 2020 election fake elector scheme. Despite this, she was re-elected to the position by the NM GOP in April 2024.
12. Tina Dziuk (national committeewoman, GOP) – Dziuk has been a national committeewoman since 2020, and was re-elected in April 2024. According to her campaign bio, she was appointed to the RNC’s Committee on Election Integrity in 2021 and served as co-chair of the Voting Systems and Technology Subcommittee. During the 2022 midterm elections, she got the RNC to provide New Mexico with a statewide incident reporting system and on election day, she served as a poll watcher “responding directly to voter complaints, in real time, while consulting attorneys in the war-room.” Dziuk amplifies election misinformation on social media, often retweeting posts from extremists like Charlie Kirk of Turning Point USA and Dinesh D’Souza, the conspiracy theorist who has made a series of highly controversial political films, including the debunked 2022 pro-Trump documentary 2000 Mules.
13. Robert Witsenhausen (Chair, Santa Fe County GOP) – Witsenhausen sends out monthly newsletters that spread distrust in the electoral process. He has described automatic voter registration as “a recipe for stealing elections” and previously claimed without evidence that poll workers “were observed breaking numerous rules.” In a June 2023 message he wrote, “The propaganda against Republicans has been laid on thick. Who can forget Biden’s ‘Red Sermon’ speech, with all the Nazi imagery of a Leni Riefenstahl production? And don’t even get me started on January 6th.” In a May 2024 message, Witsenhausen urged Republicans to vote in the June 4 primary, noting, “Everyone should flood the ballot box and show the entire country that in New Mexico it’s going to be ‘Too Big to Rig.’”
14. Julianne “Julie” Stroup (Chair, Sierra County GOP) – Stroup sent a July 2021 email to New Mexico’s State Elections Director claiming that proposed rule changes for voting in New Mexico—including the use of drop boxes and mail-in ballots—would “only ensure that cheating in elections will be easier and difficult to prevent.” She also argued that “voting in person on voting day is the only way to substantially reduce interference in our elections,” and that “mail-in ballots other than absentee ballots also have proven to be an easy avenue to interfere with fair elections. We saw this during the 2020 election cycle.”
15. Sarah Hawkes Valente (Chair, Taos County GOP) – Hawkes Valente authored a May 2023 opinion piece encouraged residents to sign petitions for a referendum against several pending bills, including HB-4 and SB-180, which she claimed “could lead to potential fraud in our election process.” She also wrote that felony voter enfranchisement “is a potential threat to election integrity,” and that the provisions in SB-180 allowing for electronic signature gathering for nominating petitions and voter convenience centers “could lead to voter fraud.”
16. John Brenna (Chair, Valencia County GOP) – John Brenna repeatedly re-posts election-related conspiracy theories and other disinformation about election integrity on his personal Twitter/X page. Examples include linking to an article exonerating Trump for his inaction on January 6, a false claim saying “9,000 previously uncounted mail-in ballots from an Illinois election were suddenly ‘found,’” and reposting a lengthy conspiracy piece arguing that “Democrats are importing illegals because they plan on stealing the election… & if it starts an uprising, 10 million military age males with no allegiance to America and contempt for Americans will be all too happy to help squash it [in exchange] for citizenship.”
The key players mentioned above have all been instrumental in fueling election denial in our state and spreading dis/misinformation for their own personal gain. It’s essential that we both acknowledge the harm caused by election denialism and take concrete steps to address it. The people of New Mexico deserve better. We deserve to have our votes counted and faith in the democratic process