Ledes from the Land of Enchantment

Bean counters no more: Treasurer’s race is ugly slugfest | Local News

Tim Eichenberg was only 22 when voters elected him as treasurer of New Mexico’s most populous county, Bernalillo. He’s now the 70-year-old state treasurer, a grizzled political veteran in the midst of another nasty campaign.

Eichenberg is not on the ballot this year, and he says he will never again run for public office. His interest is electing his protégé, Heather Benavidez, as state treasurer.

He has done more than endorse fellow Democrat Benavidez. Eichenberg is seeking government investigations of Laura Montoya, the candidate opposing Benavidez for the Democratic nomination.

Eichenberg accused Montoya of wrongdoing in a lengthy letter he sent last week to the secretary of state, attorney general and New Mexico Ethics Commission.

“It is disturbing to see that a candidate for State Treasurer … has already violated such statutes as the Campaign Reporting Act, the Financial Disclosures Act, the Governmental Conduct Act and other violations of ethical principles,” Eichenberg wrote.

He took his criticisms much further, linking his allegations against Montoya to a pair of notorious former state treasurers.

“As a public officer,” Eichenberg wrote, “I do not want to see the State Treasurer’s Office return to days of business as usual as conducted by Michael Montoya and Robert Vigil,” who served prison time for corruption while in office.

Laura Montoya, who was a two-term treasurer of Sandoval County, had a caustic reply after I shared Eichenberg’s letter with her.

“He’s an idiot,” she said.

Montoya accused Eichenberg of ignoring or disregarding campaign finance laws to smear her. Each maneuver, Montoya said, is an attempt by Eichenberg to improperly influence the primary election campaign.

Montoya has claims of her own about Eichenberg. She said he missed public money to buy radio ads about an initiative run by the Treasurer’s Office, though his real purpose was to promote Benavidez.

Nonsense, Eichenberg said. He uses savings from his office budget to buy ads alerting the public to useful programs he oversees.

One initiative Eichenberg advertised is called ABLE. Through it, disabled people might be able to qualify for tax-free savings accounts.

Benavidez manages the program and also serves as Eichenberg’s chief of staff. Benavidez said it’s a government venture that invests in people.

“I’m happy to do anything I can to help get the word out about ABLE,” Benavidez said of her involvement in advertising the program.

Perhaps the most serious ethics charge Eichenberg made against Montoya is that she failed to report unemployment benefits she received last year.

Montoya called his claim a fabrication. She said term limits had stopped her from running again for Sandoval County treasurer during the pandemic. She said she was told by an executive of the Department of Workforce Solutions and the governor’s constituent services staff that she qualified for unemployment compensation.

If that’s what they told Montoya, they were wrong. A subsequent ruling by Workforce Solutions said politicians who return to private life because of term limits are not entitled to unemployment benefits.

Eichenberg again went to extremes in criticizing Montoya.

“At the same time that she received public unemployment funds, Ms. Montoya engaged in campaigning for the office of State Treasurer during 2021,” Eichenberg said. “Ms. Montoya appears to be the subject of a state tax lien filed on January 5, 2022, by the Department of Workforce Solutions, which indicates that her source of income in 2021 may have only been unemployment compensation benefits. Based on the apparent lien , Ms. Montoya owes the Department of Workforce Solutions over $4,000 from September 2021.”

I checked into his charge against Montoya. The Sandoval County clerk’s staff said there is no lien on Montoya’s home, nor did one ever appear to exist.

For her part, Montoya said she paid back unemployment income she received for approximately a month. She said the agency had mistakenly approved her application as she searched for work during the pandemic.

Montoya also said there’s good reason no record exists of any lien on her property.

“They [Workforce Solutions] placed an accidental lien on me. I think it was removed on the same day,” Montoya said.

No one at Workforce Solutions would comment. Stacy Johnston, a spokeswoman for the agency, said every record of unemployment compensation is confidential.

Montoya in 2020 ran for Congress in New Mexico’s 3rd District, losing in the June primary election. Eichenberg said Montoya then began her campaign for state treasurer.

He claims she sought unemployment benefits while seeking a treasurer’s seat that wouldn’t begin until January 2023. Those collecting unemployment compensation should be looking for immediate employment, Eichenberg said.

It’s possible the explosive charges of campaign misdeeds might not be decided by the Secretary of State’s Office before the June 7 primary.

“I can confirm that our office received the letter from Eichenberg,” said Alex Curtas, a spokesman for the secretary of state. “We have a standard process to review all complaints like this, and we’re going through that now.”

Candidates for treasurers usually talk in arcane terms about interest rates, liquidity and yield. This spring is different. The bean counters are slugging it out, charges and countercharges flying all around.

Ringside Seat is an opinion column about people, politics and news. Contact Milan Simonich at [email protected] or 505-986-3080.

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