For four installments, Better Together New Mexico has documented how Emerge recruits candidates, trains them, connects them to an influential political network, and helps create a pipeline into public office.
Now it is time to confront what that pipeline means for New Mexico.
Emerge New Mexico is not a small organization working around the edges of state politics. Its website identifies 118 alumni currently serving in elected or appointed office, including members of Congress, state legislators, judges, and local officials.
Emerge openly celebrates its success in building a network of Democratic women and nonbinary political leaders who are prepared to run—and win.
Candidate training is not the problem.
The concern is the governing philosophy repeatedly advanced by many Emerge-trained officials: more government control, more mandates, more regulation, more taxpayer-funded programs, and more pressure on families and businesses to surrender their money and decision-making authority to Santa Fe.
The Policies Are No Longer Theoretical
New Mexicans can see this governing philosophy in the policies Emerge-trained officials sponsor and promote.
Consider paid leave.
New Mexico businesses are already required to provide employees with up to 64 hours—equivalent to eight eight-hour days—of earned paid sick leave each year under the Healthy Workplaces Act.
That legislation was sponsored by several Emerge alumni, including Christine Chandler, Angelica Rubio, Patricia Roybal Caballero, and Linda Serrato.
But the mandates did not end there.
In 2025, lawmakers returned with House Bill 11, which proposed a new state-administered program providing up to 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave. Emerge alumni Christine Chandler, Linda Serrato, and Patricia Roybal Caballero were among its sponsors.
Supporting working families is an important goal. The real disagreement is over who should make workplace decisions.
Emerge-trained lawmakers repeatedly turn to government mandates. We believe employers and employees should have the freedom to negotiate pay, flexibility, leave, and benefits that meet their needs.
Good employers understand that their people are their greatest asset. Businesses that fail to offer competitive compensation, reasonable flexibility, and a healthy workplace will lose good employees—and they should. That is how free enterprise creates accountability.
Workers have choices. Employers compete for talent. Businesses that treat people well succeed, while those that do not are forced to change.
That is a healthier and more sustainable system than allowing politicians to impose one statewide mandate after another, regardless of a business’s size, industry, financial condition, or benefits already offered.
The Default Answer Is Always More Government
The pattern extends well beyond employment law.
In 2019, House Bill 6 amended New Mexico’s personal income-tax brackets and included numerous other tax increases and expansions. Emerge alum Christine Chandler was among the bill’s sponsors.
The same government-centered approach continues through proposals involving payroll contributions, utility charges, telecommunications surcharges, environmental mandates, and new government programs.
In 2026, Emerge alumni Linda Serrato and Christine Chandler sponsored legislation creating a fund supported through surcharges collected on electric service.
Each proposal is presented as the solution to an important problem. But the solution is nearly always the same:
Give government more money.
Give government more authority.
Give government more control.
The cumulative burden is rarely acknowledged.
One tax may appear small. One surcharge may seem manageable. One regulation may sound reasonable. One employment mandate may be promoted as compassionate.
But businesses and families do not experience these policies one at a time.
They experience all of them together.
They see the total on the utility bill. They feel the deductions from each paycheck. They absorb higher insurance, fuel, housing, and operating costs.
Small businesses spend more time complying with government requirements and less time serving customers, creating jobs, and growing their companies.
Eventually, those costs are passed to consumers, reflected in lower wages, or result in fewer jobs and fewer opportunities.
Two Very Different Visions for New Mexico
The disagreement could not be clearer.
We believe:
- Strong families are the foundation of a strong state.
- People should have the opportunity to earn a good living, build a business, own a home, and raise their children without being taxed and regulated at every turn.
- Private enterprise—not government dependency—is the most effective path out of poverty.
- Businesses should compete for employees by offering better pay, greater flexibility, stronger benefits, and healthier workplaces.
- Government should protect constitutional rights, enforce the law, maintain essential infrastructure, and create fair rules that allow people to succeed.
The political network surrounding Emerge has repeatedly advanced a different model:
Government defines the benefit. Government sets the mandate. Government collects the money. Government administers the program. Government decides who qualifies.
That approach may be presented as compassion, but compassion cannot be measured by how much government spends or how many programs it creates.
It must be measured by results.
- Are New Mexico families safer?
- Are our children receiving a better education?
- Can patients find a doctor?
- Are businesses expanding?
- Are young people staying in New Mexico because they see a future here?
- Are working families becoming more prosperous and independent—or more dependent on government?
Those are the questions that matter.
This Is Why Better Together New Mexico Exists
Emerge and its allied organizations work year-round. They recruit candidates, provide training, build political relationships, develop messaging, and organize support for their agenda.
New Mexicans need an effective counterweight.
That is the role Better Together New Mexico is building.
We investigate the networks operating behind the scenes. We explain complicated legislation in language citizens can understand. We expose the real-world consequences of policies before they become law.
Most importantly, we give New Mexicans the tools to contact elected officials, participate in hearings, and make their voices heard.
We do not work for elected officials, political insiders, or a political party.
We work for New Mexicans.
Our commitment is to the families trying to build a better life, the workers trying to keep more of what they earn, the employers creating jobs, and the citizens who believe government should answer to the people—not the other way around.
Informed Citizens Can Make a Difference
We have already seen what happens when informed citizens act together.
Paid Family and Medical Leave proposals have been defeated. Clear Horizons and other damaging measures have been stopped. Tax increases have been rejected.
These outcomes prove that New Mexico’s political direction is not predetermined.
But victories do not happen by accident.
The organizations promoting greater government control are organized, funded, and working every day to expand their influence.
We must be equally informed, equally committed, and even better organized.
The Choice Belongs to New Mexicans
This is not about opposing women in leadership. It is not about blindly voting for one party and against another.
It is about understanding what candidates believe, who prepared them for office, which political networks surround them, and what policies they will advance once elected.
Voters of every party should look beyond campaign slogans and ask:
Will this candidate return power and opportunity to New Mexico’s families, workers, and businesses—or continue transferring more of both to government?
Emerge has built an impressive political machine.
But political organizations do not own New Mexico.
The people do.
New Mexicans still have the power to choose free enterprise over government dependency, opportunity over regulation, accountability over excuses, and strong families over an ever-expanding state.
Emerge has built its pipeline.
Better Together New Mexico is building the informed, organized, and determined movement needed to hold it accountable.
Read the Complete Series
If you missed the previous installments in our Emerge New Mexico series, read them here
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Better Together New Mexico investigates political networks, explains legislation, and helps citizens make their voices heard.
