Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) speaks in Albuquerue, 7/21/12

Orrin Hatch, the six-term Republican senator from Utah, was in Albuquerque Saturday (July 21) campaigning for Heather Wilson as she takes on Democrat Martin Heinrich in November for the US Senate seat that will be vacated by retiring Sen. Jeff Bingman (D-New Mexico).

A guest of the Rio Grande Foundation Speakers Series at a local hotel, Hatch defended GOP budget policies (“We’ve had four straight years of trillion-dollar deficits under Democrats and this President”), blasted President Obama’s health care plan (“This bill is going to eat us alive”) and said the upcoming presidential election is critical (“I think the next president will have at least two nominations to make on the Supreme Court”).

Capitol Report New Mexico talked to Sen. Hatch after his question and answer session. The three topics brought up here: Why fiscal conservatives should trust Republicans this time to keep spending down should they take control of Congress and why he thinks Romney can defeat Obama in November. But we start with calls from some Democrats for tighter gun control laws in the wake of the movie theater shooting in Aurora, Colorado:

 

Hatch himself is in an election fight of his own. He faces Democrat Scott Howell this November after he defeated a Tea Party-backed candidate in June in the Republican state primary. “I just came thorugh a horrendous campaign up in Utah,” he told the crowd.

(Full disclosure: Capitol Report New Mexico is funded by the Rio Grande Foundation.)