a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2KZd4unzw2JSFuSEm7guxKiQLoN_K6P0A_j8aQiqq_FTDMshZTUifZwZQ-ylHPyyCBl06iWL86F5GQJ81g5GePStndqniNYEUbcbBWujTi36GzrqIhVIZ6JzomYDO8vGBWLyQ5Ok2PZA/s1600-h/Martinez2.jpg"img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2KZd4unzw2JSFuSEm7guxKiQLoN_K6P0A_j8aQiqq_FTDMshZTUifZwZQ-ylHPyyCBl06iWL86F5GQJ81g5GePStndqniNYEUbcbBWujTi36GzrqIhVIZ6JzomYDO8vGBWLyQ5Ok2PZA/s1600/Martinez2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5359629665466957266" border="0" //ap style="font-style: italic;" class="MsoNormal"span style="font-size:130%;"Republican DA pledges to end pay to play, says winning in 2010 ‘is not going to be an easy task’/span/p p class="MsoNormal"One of the most noteworthy attendees at Doña Ana County District Attorney a href="http://www.da.state.nm.us/districts/third/index.html" target="_blank"Susana Martinez’s/a news conference announcing her gubernatorial campaign this evening was County Commissioner a href="http://donaanacounty.org/commissioners/district1/" target="_blank"Oscar Vásquez Butler/a./p p class="MsoNormal"Martinez is a Republican, and Butler is a Democrat -- one who has been publicly critical of the district attorney’s office and others in law enforcement who are close to Martinez in the past./p p class="MsoNormal"“I’m here to eat,” Butler said when first approached just before the start of Martinez’s announcement at Roberto’s restaurant in Las Cruces. Questioned further, he said he’s not supporting Martinez, and added, “I’m just here to hear what she has to say.”/p p class="MsoNormal"A moment later, Martinez walked in. She and Butler exchanged a handshake and a joke./p p class="MsoNormal"The moment passed. Butler didn’t stick around long. But he made an appearance./ppThat anecdote is indicative of the relationship many Democrats in the county have with Martinez. She has won election four times -- twice with almost 60 percent of the vote -- in a heavily Democratic county.br //p pAnd Butler knows that./pp style="font-weight: bold;" class="MsoNormal"span style="font-size:130%;"Democrat is ‘excited to see her in the race’/span/p p class="MsoNormal"Butler wasn’t the only Democrat who showed up to see Martinez announce that she wants to become the first Las Crucen to be elected governor since a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garrey_Carruthers" target="_blank"Garrey Carruthers/a did it in 1986./p p class="MsoNormal"“Though I fully support a href="http://www.dianedenish.com/" target="_blank"Diane (Denish)/a, Susana has done a lot of good for Las Cruces and Doña Ana County, and I’m excited to see her in the race,” said Michael Ray Huerta, another Democrat who attended Martinez’s announcement./p p class="MsoNormal"Huerta is a member of the Democratic Party’s state central committee and worked on the campaign of U.S. Rep. a href="http://teague.house.gov/" target="_blank"Harry Teague/a, D-N.M. last year. Like Butler, he said he attended Martinez’s announcement “to check her out and see what she had to say.”/p p class="MsoNormal"Another Democrat in attendance was Arturo Uribe, an activist from Mesquite who works with a non-partisan organization that organizes candidate forums during elections./p p class="MsoNormal"“I think it’s exciting that we have someone like Susana Martinez running,” Uribe said, adding that “today is a historic day in Doña Ana County” and also saying he’s not endorsing Martinez or anyone else./p p class="MsoNormal"Martinez, 50, has been district attorney since beating then-incumbent Democrat Greg Valdez for the job in 1996. Martinez was a Democrat when she worked in Valdez’s office in the early 1990s, but he fired her. She switched parties and successfully ran against him after suing for wrongful termination and winning a settlement of more than $100,000 from the state./p p class="MsoNormal"That party switch and some of her prosecutions of public officials have made Martinez unpopular with many local leaders in the Democratic Party, but that hasn’t stopped her from winning re-election three times in a Democratic stronghold of a county./p p style="font-weight: bold;" class="MsoNormal"span style="font-size:130%;"A pledge to end pay to play/span/p p class="MsoNormal"Martinez gave a brief speech this evening in which she said public safety is her top priority but also talked about improving education, empowering small businesses and putting an end to pay to play in state government./p p class="MsoNormal"She said she has learned from being a prosecutor the importance of treating all people equally, regardless of their financial status./p p class="MsoNormal"“I want to treat everyone the same, regardless of who you gave money to or who you didn’t give money to,” Martinez said./p p class="MsoNormal"Of course, it wasn’t only Democrats who attended the announcement. Most of the well over 150 people in attendance were Republicans./p p class="MsoNormal"Among them was Aaron Henry Diaz, a Republican activist and a href="http://www.newmexicopolitico.org/" target="_blank"blogger/a. He said Martinez “is something New Mexico needs at this time,” saying the county was full of “corruption and patron, dirty politics” when she took office and she has done a lot to clean it up./p p style="font-weight: bold;" class="MsoNormal"span style="font-size:130%;"A tough road ahead/span/p p class="MsoNormal"In an interview following the event, Martinez said she isn’t resigning from the district attorney job and doesn’t plan to stop working while she campaigns. Though her staff will pick up much of the workload, Martinez described herself as a workaholic who is connected all the time -- even in her vehicle -- through technology, so she’ll be able to travel the state campaigning while still working./p p class="MsoNormal"“I don’t just drive and I don’t just sit in the car,” she said. “I work in the car.”/p p class="MsoNormal"As for her campaign, Martinez said she has interviewed some potential staffers but not yet hired any./p p class="MsoNormal"Asked how she’ll raise enough money to compete, Martinez said she has been introduced to several business owners in Albuquerque and around the state who often contribute to campaigns, so she believes she’ll be able to raise money from those who can afford to give a lot. She was handed a check for $100 at tonight’s announcement, which she said is indicative of her ability to raise lots of money through smaller donations from working-class people the way President Barack Obama did in 2008./p p class="MsoNormal"Martinez acknowledged during her speech the tough road ahead of her./p p class="MsoNormal"“This is not going to be an easy task,” she said. “I have a lot of money to raise and I have a lot of ground to cover.”/p p class="MsoNormal"Martinez is the only declared Republican candidate for governor, but several other Republicans are also considering running./p p class="MsoNormal"Former state GOP Chairman a href="http://allenweh2010.com/" target="_blank"Allen Weh/a and state Rep. a href="http://www.nmlegis.gov/lcs/legdetails.aspx?SPONCODE=HARNO" target="_blank"Janice Arnold-Jones/a have formed exploratory committees. Former U.S. Rep. a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heather_Wilson" target="_blank"Heather Wilson/a and a href="http://www.dwturner.com/about/?t=Douglas_W_Turneramp;m=2" target="_blank"Doug Turner/a, CEO of the Albuquerque-based public relations firm DW Turner, say they are seriously considering running for the GOP nomination. All are Albuquerque residents./p p class="MsoNormal"On the Democratic side, Lt. Gov. Denish is the only declared candidate, though Senate Majority Leader a href="http://www.nmlegis.gov/lcs/legdetails.aspx?SPONCODE=SSANC" target="_blank"Michael Sanchez/a says he’s formed an exploratory committee./pp class="MsoNormal"span style="font-style: italic;"This article has been updated for clarity./spanbr //pdiv class="blogger-post-footer"img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/23370090-2569122962570960886?l=haussamen.blogspot.com'//div
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