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POLICY
Road Map for New Mexico
INITIATIVE
Government Transparency & Accountability
The people making your life more expensive are out of
touch with the struggles to make ends meet.
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Sarah Silva and a county commissioner held a secret meeting with data center developers. Elected officials signed non-disclosure agreements—legal agreements that prevented constituents from knowing what was being decided about their own community's water supply. Silva then accepted money from the same data center contractor.
That is corruption. It’s not incompetence or a difference of opinion. It’s corruption.
Ben will demand full public transparency on any development deal affecting District 53, refuse to sign agreements that hide government business from constituents, and push for real accountability mechanisms so this never happens again.
If it can't be said in public, it shouldn't be done at all.
INITIATIVE
Affordability & Small Business
The people making your life more expensive are out of
touch with the struggles to make ends meet.
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Ben’s employees and their families are relying on him to make payroll every week.
He knows what every new regulation, every new mandate, and every new fee actually costs, because he pays it, and so do his employees. The government has spent years passing budgets that send your tax dollars north while Doña Ana and Otero get the leftovers. They call that governance. Ben calls it what it is: taking your money and giving you nothing back.
Ben will cut the red tape strangling small businesses, work to get rid of the extra gasoline tax being imposed on everyone, demand accountability for wasteful spending, and fight for budgets that actually serve Southern New Mexico.
INITIATIVE
Public Safety &
Catch and Release
The government pushed "bail reform" on New Mexico. Our communities are living with the consequences.
Dangerous people are being arrested and released. Repeat offenders cycle through the courts with no real consequences. Local law enforcement is doing its job, while Santa Fe is tying its hands.
Ben supports real consequences for violent crime, full funding and backing for local law enforcement, and the immediate end of catch and release policies that put families at risk. Safe neighborhoods aren't a political position. They're a basic obligation of government—one the current majority has failed to meet.
INITIATIVE
Water & Data Centers
Our water is not for sale. Especially not in a secret meeting.
Southern New Mexico's water is its lifeblood—for ranchers, farmers, families, and businesses that have been here for generations. Out-of-state data center corporations want it. And some of your elected officials have been more than happy to negotiate on their behalf, behind closed doors, with secret agreements to keep you in the dark.
Ben will protect Southern New Mexico's water rights, oppose any development that threatens long-term water access for residents, and demand that every negotiation involving public resources will happen in public with full transparency.
INITIATIVE
Roads & Infrastructure
Our roads have been deteriorating for decades. Sarah Silva called it someone else's problem.
Basic infrastructure—roads, bridges, the things that get you to work and get your kids to school—has been neglected in this district for as long as anyone can remember. Meanwhile, Sarah Silva has shown this is not an important priority for her.
Ben will make infrastructure a non-negotiable budget priority and stop accepting the excuse that Southern New Mexico has to wait its turn.
INITIATIVE
Families, Schools & CYFD
Outside consultants got paid. Kids got left behind.
Parents got shut out.
New Mexico’s schools are ranked last in the Nation for education. Teachers are overloaded with paperwork and too many subjects, meanwhile the students are being left behind on basic skills such as reading and math.
Schools are cutting parents out of important decisions about education and health. Parents should be the decision-makers for their children's education and health, welcomed to collaborate with teachers instead of being shut out of the classrooms.
Ben will defend parental rights, demand full transparency and accountability from NM’s Children Youth and Families Department, and fight for schools that prepare kids for real careers right here in New Mexico.
INITIATIVE
Property Rights, Rural Livelihoods & The 2nd Amendment
The people trying to regulate away your way of life
don't live it and never have.
Ranchers, farmers, oil and gas workers, and rural families in this district are being buried under environmental mandates pushed by politicians who answer to out-of-state donors and national advocacy groups. Sarah Silva supports policies that strangle the industries Southern New Mexico depends on—and she's been rewarded for it with a 100% score from a conservation group with ties to foreign money.
Ben has stood with ranchers, farmers, and industry workers across New Mexico. He'll defend property rights, protect water access, fight heavy-handed environmental overreach, and never waver on the Second Amendment—including his full opposition to SB17, the most extreme anti-gun bill in the country.