CV NEWS FEED // According to an off-the-record recording which was leaked on Friday, Democratic New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham appeared to slam U.S. Border Patrol for seizing marijuana shipments at the border.
“They’re saying that they are worried about fentanyl so [Border Patrol is] taking all of our cannabis, and they tried to, and they’re detaining people,” Lujan Grisham said in the leaked recording.
“We’ve never done that,” the governor added. “We just use discretion, and look the other way.”
She continued to apparently call law enforcement at the border “bad”:
But the press also knows that the bad Border Patrol is taking a hard stance, and the only way is either we have to adjust it or I have to send you a letter saying, “You’re persecuting the states, you are not using your discretion, you are not working with me on immigration,” and I don’t want to send that letter, but I’m boxed in hard.
Also in the recording, Lujan Grisham indicated that she is “cranky with” embattled Biden administration Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayrokas.
“[Mayorkas] knew that was coming, he did not say a word to me,” Lujan Grisham said, most likely referring to her administration receiving media criticism over federal immigration authorities seizing drug shipments at the New Mexico-Mexico border.
“POLITICO wants to write an article,” the governor stated. “Every single major press group is asking repeatedly, basically accusing me of being feckless, and uh, Huffington Post, I mean, they’re all going to write about it.”
POLITICO noted that “Lujan Grisham’s comments came in a phone conversation with a senior administration official — whose identity has not been disclosed — that was recorded by a third party and posted on X [formerly known as Twitter] by Tore Maras, who runs the website ‘Tore Says.’”
“Lujan Grisham’s office confirmed the audio’s authenticity to POLITICO on Friday, and said the conversation was with a “high-level federal administration official,” but did not specify which agency,” POLITICO added.
Maras wrote in her X post leaking the recording: “The governor on New Mexico stated that they look the other way when drugs come through their border and from the sounds of it – she is getting pressure about LOADS that are coming in that are detrimental.”
“These politicians are part of the cartels!” she emphasized.
Maras was an independent (previously Republican) candidate for Ohio Secretary of State in 2022.
A writer for the conservative blog RedState called Lujan Grisham’s words “just incredible.”
“With all the problems in New Mexico and at the Southern Border, her concern is about the supposed bad press she may receive from drug shipments being seized,” the blogger, who goes by the moniker “Bonchie,” continued:
In her comments, [Lujan Grisham] expressed outrage that the “bad Border Patrol” are doing their jobs and taking cannabis shipments when they stop vehicles.
For full context, she appears to be talking about in-state-grown marijuana, which Democrats have deemed “legal” in the state. Federal law still prohibits it, though. It is not the Border Patrol’s place to “look the other way” and break the law to help out a left-wing governor’s drug trade.
“Wait, is a Democrat governor facilitating the drug trade and mad the CBP are getting in the way?” Bonchie wrote on X. “Because that sure sounds like what she’s saying.”
“She’s more worried about getting drugs in the hands of her residents, locally grown or not, than solving the actual border crisis,” the blogger added. “Just astonishing.”
Last September, Lujan Grisham made headlines after she signed a widely panned sweeping anti-gun executive order.
The order was quickly denounced by well-known left-wing gun control advocates such as David Hogg and Rep. Ted Lieu, D-CA, who noted that it was unconstitutional.
Democratic New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez – who Lujan Grisham herself appointed – quickly decided to not defend the executive order in court.
