Депутат штата Нью-Мексико устроилась помощником прокурора, что вызвало требование республиканцев к проведению расследования

State Rep. Andrea Romero has been working part-time at the First Judicial District Attorney’s Office since May — a position that raised questions and concerns this week from Republicans and state officials. The Santa Fe Democrat’s hiring was at least slightly complicated by her role as a lawmaker, in that District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies offered her the job “contingent upon ... [an] ethics check due to your position as a State Representative in the New Mexico legislature,” according to a May 12 offer letter. “Your position as a legislator and a commissioner on the recently passed New Mexico Truth Commission into Zorro Ranch and the estate of Jeffrey Epstein will have no role in your position at the [First Judicial District Attorney’s Office],” Carmack-Altwies wrote in the letter. “If legislative responsibilities conflict with your scheduled hours, you must take unpaid leave,” the letter said. And the situation appeared to have become more complicated by Tuesday, with House Republicans calling for Attorney General Raúl Torrez to investigate Romero “over potential felony violations” related to her new job. Questions about Romero’s role center on the state separation of powers doctrine, which generally requires boundaries among those in power in the legislative, judicial and executive branches of government, as well as on whether it’s a conflict of interest for her to work for an office whose budget she could influence. Romero said the position she’s filling was one of many advertised openings in the office — which she said has been hiring new attorneys nearly every week since she started. “I think it’s pretty straightforward. It’s a part-time job,” said Romero, who was elected in 2018. “Juggling our legislative responsibilities with a part-time job is what many of us do as legislators.” A matter of opinion Romero said she asked Torrez’s office for an opinion on whether she could work at the District Attorney’s Office prior to starting the job and got a response she interpreted as a green light, since she would only be working as an employee doing “intake” on cases and would not have the authority to act as a district attorney. Romero cut and pasted the response she said she received from the attorney general into an email to The New Mexican. The block of text she provided — which doesn’t include a date or signature — references AG Opinion 2024-04, issued by Torrez on Feb. 12, 2024, in response to an inquiry from Rep. Andrea Reeb. Attorneys for actor Alec Baldwin had questioned whether her work as a special prosecutor on the criminal case Baldwin faced in connection with the on-set shooting death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins violated the state separation of powers doctrine. The opinion — issued nearly a year after Reeb, R-Clovis, voluntarily resigned as special prosecutor — said “a legislator is not prohibited from serving as a private special assistant district attorney,” in part because the power exercised by a special prosecutor is “only temporary or occasional.” The attorney general’s response to Romero highlighted part of the opinion that distinguished between different kinds of work performed in a district attorney’s office. A district attorney’s office has “public officers,” including deputy and assistant district attorney positions, and “public employees,” which includes staff who “do not exercise the authority of the district attorney.” Separation of powers prohibitions would only apply to work done by “public officers,” according to the opinion. “There appears to be no separation of powers impediment to legislators serving in these other employment positions in a district attorney’s office,” the response Romero provided said. Romero said she falls into the second category, as she is only an employee with no statutory authority. While Romero indicated Monday she interpreted the response as green light to her part-time role, a state Department of Justice spokesperson contradicted that assumption Tuesday. “Our office advised both the Legislature and the First Judicial District Attorney’s Office in late 2025 that members of the New Mexico Legislature are prohibited from serving as an assistant district attorney,” the department’s Chief of Staff Lauren Rodriguez wrote in an email. In addition to a 1941 attorney general opinion, such employment is clearly proscribed by state law, “which bars any legislator from receiving compensation as a state employee and bars any state officer from compensating a legislator for their services,” Rodriguez wrote. “While we previously determined that a limited appointment of a member of the legislature to serve as a special prosecutor in one case did not violate the separation of powers, no such exemption exists for legislators serving as either full-time or part-time employees of a district attorney’s office,” she added. ‘Assistant trial attorney’ The devil is in the details. District attorney spokesperson Catherine Lynch wrote in a Tuesday email Romero was hired as an “Assistant Trial Attorney in a non-court facing role” for which she is paid just over $48 per hour and “does not sign pleadings or represent the state in court.” But a job posting for the position specifically states: “This position represents the State of New Mexico in criminal proceedings.” In addition, Carmack-Altwies’ letter offered Romero the position of “Assistant District Attorney” — one of the positions a legislator would not be able to hold without running into separation of powers issues, according to the 2024 opinion. Lynch did not respond to follow-up questions seeking clarity on whether assistant trial attorneys do in fact represent the state in court, as stated in the job posting; whether the offer letter’s reference to the position of “assistant district attorney” was an error; and whether the agency created a unique position for Romero. The state Sunshine Portal lists Romero’s salary as about $94,000 per year. However, Romero said Monday, “that would be if it was full time.” At $48 per hour, Romero’s annual pay would work out to about $99,000 per year if full time. That’s a bit higher than the $94,000 per year paid to other assistant trial attorneys in the office — including some with more experience than Romero, who graduated from law school in 2022. Romero — whose previous professional experience includes “international development work in Mozambique” and ostrich farming, according to her campaign website — said Monday she has limited legal experience outside of part-time work for a civil law firm. She said Monday she had been thinking about getting a legal job in hopes of “really understanding how the system works and what it is we can do to improve it.” She added the job was “a good fit” for satisfying her curiosity about the justice system. Romero responded to initial inquiries for this story in a Monday evening phone call, but did not respond to follow-up calls and an email Tuesday seeking a more complete record of her inquiry to Torrez’s office and its response and her response to whether she was concerned the job could create the appearance of a conflict of interest. Pamela Armstrong, a spokesperson for House Democrats, initially told The New Mexican she would follow up with responses on Romero’s behalf. She later directed questions to District Attorney’s Office, saying they had more to do with Romero’s work outside the Legislature. Can’t be ‘brushed aside’ Romero’s new role appears not to have been widely known prior to this week. House Republican Whip Alan Martinez, R-Rio Rancho, said in a statement Tuesday he wrote a letter calling on Torrez “to immediately investigate” whether Romero violated state law by accepting the job. The letter references the same statute Rodriguez did barring “any state officer from compensating a legislator for their services.” It also asks Torrez to also investigate Carmack-Altwies’ role “in authorizing or facilitating Romero’s employment and compensation.” “This is not a technical ethics question that can be brushed aside,” Martinez said in a statement. “If these laws were violated, New Mexicans deserve answers and accountability.”