Voters enter the Doña Ana County Government Center to cast their vote for the local 2023 elections on Nov. 7. (Danielle Prokop / Source NM)
A new report issued by legislative analysts on state election spending prompted a rebuttal to lawmakers Thursday from New Mexico Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver.
Legislative Finance Committee analysts report the Secretary of State’s office spent funding set aside for 2025 on the 2024 primaries, concluding that while the Department of Finance and Administration approved the action, it potentially meant the Legislature would have to provide additional funds for future costs, and likely violated the state Constitution.
The report notes that the cost of New Mexico elections has nearly tripled in recent years, in part due to major reform efforts by the Legislature allowing the state to manage local elections for cities and counties. The state spent approximately $15 million per election in 2024, according to the report.
Consolidating elections at the state level “can lead to greater efficiency and consistency,” the report says, but also opens the state to further risks. The largest costs in the elections included poll worker salaries, the number of polling locations and rising costs for election equipment.
The report notes the state could save $3.2 million by cutting 285 polling sites.
The report concludes the Secretary of State’s office needs to better predict the costs of elections by collecting more data for specific county costs; establishing further reimbursement guidelines; finding savings on election equipment; and potentially cutting state payments for county-determined polling sites and poll workers.
Toulouse Oliver told lawmakers the one finding of concern — that the office violated the state Constitution with election spending from a $15 million fund created by the Legislature in 2024 — came at the direction of the Department of Finance and Administration and LFC Director Charles Sallee.
“I want to be very clear that was not our idea of how to do things, and in fact, I expressed my opinion that it was very, very bad public policy,” she said.
In an interview with Source, Sallee described Toulouse Oliver’s comments as “pretty misleading testimony in my view.”
Sallee characterized the conversation he had with Toulouse Oliver as one that established the New Mexico Department of Finance Authority’s power to reimburse counties for expenses in the new fiscal year, for prior elections when legislation establishing the state’s $15 million Election Fund went into effect.
“It wasn’t like we told them to overspend; they had already overspent,” Sallee told Source.
Toulouse Oliver on Thursday criticized the report for being rushed, saying it provided “incomplete and premature conclusions.” Toulouse Oliver also noted that the Massachusetts Institute of Technology had ranked New Mexico elections first in the nation last year for both security and accessibility.
“This is the first evaluation LFC has conducted on elections and it really failed to reflect the nuance, expertise and complexity,” she said.
In a rebuttal letter submitted alongside the report, Toulouse Oliver wrote: “Cutting funding for elections in New Mexico risks undoing all the great progress that has been made to modernize our elections in recent years and could compromise election security and voter accessibility.”
The recommendations to cut polling places, for example, could require voters to travel longer distances to cast a ballot, she said, adding the placement of voting centers should be left up to the counties.
Toulouse Oliver Legislature requested lawmakers provide funding for operations, as well as projects for cybersecurity, data collection and education for both voters and county staff.
“We did not have enough money to get through this last pay period this year,” Toulouse Oliver said.
Sen. Linda Trujillo (D-Santa Fe) asked Toulouse Oliver if the state would save money by conducting elections fully by mail, which occurs in Colorado, Utah, Washington and Oregon.
Toulouse Oliver said her successor — she is term-limited from running again — would be the best person to consider that change, but said it would most likely cut costs, especially when it comes to pollworkers.
“We’d still need a lot of people to help process those ballots but it wouldn’t be the number we’re using now,” Toulouse Oliver said.
Toulouse Oliver concluded by saying her office was aligned with many of the recommendations put forward.
“We think a lot of the recommendations in this report are good, and a lot of them are things we’re already working on,” she said. “We just need your help to get them over the finish line.”
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