Navajo attorney and local miner challenge incumbent lawmaker for House District 69 seat

Rep. Harry Martinez (center) has two primary challenger opponents for New Mexico House District 69. He is facing Michelle Pauline Abeyta (left) and Stanley Michael (right). (Courtesy Photos)

In the Democratic primary race for House District 69, incumbent Harry Garcia faces Navajo attorney Michelle Pauline Abeyta and miner Stanley Michael. With no Republican running, whoever wins this race on June 4th will most likely go to the state Legislature in January.

District 69 lies west of Albuquerque from White Rock all the way to Alamo Navajo Reservation. It’s one of the biggest districts with six counties.

As a member of the Navajo Nation, Michelle Pauline Abeyta said her top priorities for this rural district include health care, housing, and the safety of infrastructure within schools.

“The buildings in a lot of communities are deteriorating, they’re old, and they’re not sustaining the population,” she said. “They’re not a safe space for our teachers, our staff, or students.”

Abeyta said that her incumbent challenger has not had a competitive opponent and the main reason she decided to run was the lack of work being done to fund a preschool program within her community. This encouraged her to ask other community members within the district.

“Who else has been left out? Who else has not received the support they needed? And come to find out it was almost every community,” she said.

Harry Garcia has been in office since 2016, and said he has experience, serving on dozens of legislative committees, including as chairman.

If reelected, he wants to focus on education, helping senior citizens, and getting tougher on crime. The legislation he sponsored in the last session often touched on those issues. But he supports gun rights.

“It doesn’t matter how many guns we take away from citizens that are law abiding, or put restrictions on them,” he said. “They’ll just buy them on the streets, or they will steal them, or they can buy them online.”

Garcia served in Vietnam and said we need to address mental health for veterans.

“New Mexico is our second highest in the nation from Veteran suicides. With what our veterans are going through are terrible, we need to address that and get them better benefits for our veterans,” he said.

The third candidate, Stanley Michael is a community advocate who grew up in San Mateo, New Mexico, who’s been involved in the community by coaching baseball and football for many years.

“I’m not a politician. I’m a father, I’m a grandfather, I’m an uncle, I’m a brother, I’m a coach, you know, I’m a husband. I am no different than anybody that’s walking into that area to vote,” he said. “And know that I will stand up for him no matter what because I can see the big picture.”

As an active miner, Michael sees the advantages of cleaner energy but knows the struggles of finding the power to supply it.

“We need more energy than that’s being supplied right now. And that’s just it. And people are not focused on that. And we’re going to get to a point in our life where utilities are going to be tremendously expensive, and nobody’s gonna be able to afford them. And people don’t realize we’re getting to that point,” he said.

Ever since the Marathon Oil refinery shut down in 2020, Michael has been committed to bringing more jobs to his community.

“And none of our current representatives and senators that are currently in there now have done nothing to bring any more jobs to this area,” he said.

Michael wants to address early childhood development, affordable health care, and housing shortages. And as a way to be tougher on crime, he said he wants to enforce the three strikes law in New Mexico to hold criminals accountable.

Garcia is far ahead of the others in fundraising with $170,500. The biggest donors are candidates or office holders, including House Speaker Javier Martinez. Abeyta has raised about $36,300, with the majority coming from individuals, but also the Climate Cabinet, a national climate change coalition, and Emily’s List, which supports Democratic women who support reproductive rights. Stanley has raised just twelve hundred $1,200, most of it from himself.

Support for this coverage comes from the Thornburg Foundation.

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