NEW MEXICO

US sued over lack of protection plan for rare grouse

ALBUQUERQUE – An environmental group is suing U.S. wildlife managers, saying they have failed to protect a rare grouse found in parts of the Midwest that include one of the country’s most prolific areas for oil and gas development.

A lawsuit filed on Oct. 25 by the Center for Biological Diversity says the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is nearly five months late in releasing a final rule outlining protections for the lesser prairie chicken.

Once listed as a threatened species, the prairie chicken’s habitat spans parts of New Mexico, Colorado, Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas – including a portion of the oil-rich Permian Basin that straddles the New Mexico-Texas state line.

Environmentalists have been pushing to reinstate federal protections for years. They consider the species severely threatened, citing lost and fragmented habitat as the result of oil and gas development, livestock grazing, farming and the building of roads and power lines.

The Fish and Wildlife Service in 2021 proposed listing the southern population in New Mexico and the southern reaches of the Texas Panhandle as endangered and those birds in the northern part of the species’ range as threatened. The agency had a deadline of June 1.

The species was once thought to number in the millions. Now, surveys show, the five-year average population across the entire range hovers around 30,000 individual birds.

A little smaller and lighter in color than the greater prairie chicken, the lesser prairie chicken is known for spring courtship rituals that include flamboyant dances by the males and a cacophony of clucking.

Trump endorses GOP nominee in race for governor

SANTA FE – Former President Donald Trump has endorsed Republican nominee for governor Mark Ronchetti in a social media post.

It’s unclear how the endorsement influences Ronchetti’s prospects in the Nov. 8 general election in a state that Trump lost twice. President Joe Biden won the New Mexico vote by roughly 11 percentage points in 2020.

In a post on the Truth Social social media network, Trump called incumbent Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham “absolutely terrible” and said that Ronchetti “will be tough & smart on Crime, the Border & everything else. Mark (h)as my Total Endorsement!”

Ronchetti has campaigned for governor at arms length from Trump. The two have never spoken, said Ronchetti’s campaign spokesman Ryan Sabel.

In a statement, Sabel highlighted a gamut of high-profile endorsements for Ronchetti, including Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, former U.N. Ambassador Nicki Haley, former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson “and now former President Trump.”

Prominent endorsements for Lujan Grisham’s include Vice President Kamala Harris, California Gov. Gavin Newsom and former President Barack Obama.

ARIZONA

State agrees not to enforce total abortion ban until 2023

PHOENIX – Arizona’s attorney general has agreed not to enforce a near total ban on abortions at least until next year, a move that Planned Parenthood Arizona on Oct. 27 credited with allowing the group to restart abortion care across the state.

The state’s largest provider of abortions restarted services at only their Tucson clinics after an appeals court blocked enforcement of the old law on Oct. 7. A lower court had allowed enforcement of that law on Sept. 23, halting all abortions statewide.

On Oct. 27, Planned Parenthood said services would resume statewide, including at clinics in metro Phoenix and in Flagstaff.

The only exception to the law is if the mother’s life is in jeopardy. The pre-statehood abortion ban law had been blocked since Roe was decided in 1973, but Republican Attorney General Mark Brnovich asked a court in Tucson to allow it to be enforced this summer. The law dating to 1864 carries a prison sentence of two to five years.

After the judge in Tucson agreed with Brnovich, the court of appeals temporarily overrode her and set a schedule for Planned Parenthood and the Arizona attorney general’s office lawyers to file their legal briefs in the appeal. Those document are due by a Nov. 17 deadline.

Meanwhile, a Phoenix physician who runs a clinic that provides abortions and the Arizona Medical Association filed a separate lawsuit that sought to block the territorial-era law, arguing that laws enacted by the Legislature after 1973?s Roe v. Wade decision should take precedence and abortions should be allowed until 15 weeks into a pregnancy.

Brnovich sought to place that lawsuit on hold until the court of appeals rules on the Planned Parenthood case. In an agreement with the abortion doctor and the medical association, he agreed not to enforce the old law until at least 45 days after a final ruling in the original case.

Any decision by the court of appeals is certain to be appealed to the state Supreme Court, so any final decision could take well into 2023.

A law enacted by the Legislature this year limits abortions to 15 weeks into a pregnancy, well before the 24 weeks generally allowed under the Roe decision that was overruled by the U.S. Supreme Court in June.

NAVAJO NATION

Officials plan to investigate missing tribal members

LEUPP, Ariz. – Navajo Nation officials have issued an executive order to investigate and locate missing tribal members in a manner that is empathetic to victims and their families.

Tribal President Jonathan Nez met on Oct. 24 with Navajo Nation police, the FBI and prosecutors in Arizona, New Mexico and Utah for the plan’s signing ceremony.

The crisis of missing and slain Native Americans has been getting more attention from elected officials and policymakers across the U.S.

In July, the FBI in Albuquerque released a list of more than 170 Native Americans it had verified as missing throughout New Mexico and the Navajo Nation that stretches into Arizona and Utah and covers nearly 27,500 square miles.

FBI officials said many records of missing Indigenous persons were incomplete or outdated because the record was not updated once additional details were made available or when the person was located.

“Multiple jurisdiction systems have historically failed the victims and their families,” Nez said in a statement. “Reporting, collecting and sharing missing persons data among various jurisdictions characterizes this problem’s true scope. The executive order will set a new tone of hope on this issue that impacts our nation.”

WYOMING

Grant will let food bank continue summer and after-school program

A grant given to the Food Bank of Wyoming will allow them to continue their Totes of Hope program, which provides food for children outside of school hours – on weekends, after school and in the summers.

Save the Children U.S. gave the food bank $50,000. Totes of Hope has a focus on children living in Wyoming’s “most rural areas,” a release from the food bank said.

Moreover, the grant will be used as a way to raise awareness for the program; again, especially in less-populated areas of the state.

One in six children in Wyoming go hungry. With the end of federally funded school lunches and the rising inflation rates, the food bank is using these grant dollars to drive support for Totes of Hope, which is among other programs that the food bank uses to provide nutrition to the people who, arguably, need it most.

As the Wyoming Distribution Center for the Food Bank of the Rockies, Food Bank of Wyoming is the largest hunger relief organization in the state. They promise that “every dollar raised in Wyoming stays in Wyoming.”