New Mexico Governor Demands New Bureaucracy to Oversee Gas Price Hike

January 7, 2022

As part of her budget recommendation for the upcoming legislative session, Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham is requesting $2.5 million to create a 15-person “Climate Change Bureau.” The newly-created bureaucracy would cost taxpayers more than $166,000 per employee and be put in charge of implementing the Governor’s Clean Fuel Standard Act which will raise gas prices across the state.

Despite the fact the Clean Fuel Standard failed to pass the legislature in 2021, the Governor is demanding the proposal be brought back in the 2022 legislative session. While New Mexico’s families are currently paying gas prices that are 40 percent higher than last year, the Governor’s proposal would increase the cost of gas even more.

It’s despicable that Governor Lujan Grisham not only wants to raise the price of gas on our families, but she wants to use millions in taxpayer dollars for more bureaucrats to make sure that increase is put into place. With inflation at a 40-year high, New Mexicans are already paying massive price increases while the state is a national leader in unemployment. Perhaps if the Governor were actually paying for her own gasoline, she wouldn’t be so quick to please her green special interests.