Lt. Gov. Diane Denish has been trumpeting her commitment to transparency. But New Mexico Watchdog has some real life experience with the Lt. Gov.’s commitment as practiced. Since last Fall we have been submitting requests to inspect the public records held by her office showing how she chose to spend $225,000 in federal [...]

Following up on Thom Cole’s story in the Albuquerque Journal on Lt. Gov. Diane Denish’s extensive and expensive use of state jets during our budget crisis, here is a spreadsheet covering her use of state aircraft since 2003. A key to the destination codes is below the spreadsheet. Copy of Aircraft Usage by Lt Gov [...]

New Mexico Lt. Governor Diane Denish used over $50,000 of federal stimulus funds meant for essential state services to fly herself, staff members and her husband in state planes. The information was obtained from records produced by the New Mexico Department of Finance and Administration. The Lt. Governor’s Office did not disclose these records [...]

In the tussle over who would control allocation of $61 million in federal funds awarded to New Mexico under the 2003 Jobs Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act, Governor Bill Richardson ended up outflanking and outrunning the Legislature. Despite the Legislature’s exclusive constitutional authority to appropriate funds, Richardson succeeded in exercising sole discretion in [...]

Records from Lt. Governor Diane Denish’s Office reveal glaring discrepancies that indicate false vouchers and payments for services that could not have been rendered as of the date the payments were approved. New Mexico Watchdog reviewed all the voucher packets for the contract public information officer hired by Denish in 2004. This worker, Lauran [...]

Lt. Governor Diane Denish has issued a flawed mea culpa for using federal stimulus dollars to fund her political operations. After initially calling our reporting (in her KNME-TV interview last Friday) a “patently false lie” and attacking our credibility by labeling us a right-wing group instead of addressing the facts as reported, she has [...]

In response to inquiries begun by New Mexico Watchdog, Lt. Governor Diane Denish has admitted to improper use of federal stimulus funds. Her office has never responded to our questions. Nor has her office sent us the news release sent to other media organizations. Therefore, we will link to the excellent coverage [...]

Our close examination of the records of the office of Lt. Governor Diane Denish has turned into a case study. We started reporting how $62 million was appropriated by the Governor without legislation authorization. That in itself is an extraordinary statement. In our constitutional system of government, the Legislator holds the purse [...]

Here’s video of the train bringing Democratic Presidential candidate John Kerry to Las Vegas, NM on 8/7/04. Did Lt. Governor Diane Denish use public funds to promote or assist this campaign visit? See our related report.

A worker for Lt. Governor Diane Denish was paid from public funds for time billed on August 4, 2004, as “work on Kerry for Saturday.” That Saturday, on a train leased by his presidential campaign committee, John Kerry rolled into Las Vegas, New Mexico, for a political rally and then into Albuquerque for the [...]