Why does gov. have to mandate EVs if they’re so popular?

There aren’t a lot of rules in the communications business, but there is one Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham knows well: Use holidays to bury inconvenient news.

While everyone was celebrating Independence Day, Governor Lujan Grisham held a press event on the Monday before the holiday. She went to a car dealership to promote electric vehicles and her new regulations to force their sales.

Using our Independence Day to celebrate new government rules — King George would be proud.

Lujan Grisham is imposing new rules on New Mexico requiring nearly half, 43%, of new vehicles be electric vehicles starting in the 2027 model year. But wait, there’s more. The requirement rises to a whopping 82% by 2032. How the governor arrived a 43 and 82% isn’t explained because you just need to trust the science. This is news that most New Mexicans will not find welcome, and that’s why she tried to hide it by making the announcement during a holiday.

Here’s the truth: Electric vehicles are unpopular in New Mexico. As a mostly rural, wide-open state with one of the smallest population densities, we are uniquely ill-equipped for EVs. It’s common for people to drive hundreds of miles on a regular basis. We do not have gas stations – let alone EV charging ports – on every corner.

I filed an open records request with the state Motor Vehicle Department and found that a whopping 0.8% of the automobiles on the road are EVs. Not surprisingly, most are clustered in Albuquerque and Santa Fe.

It is not just the public that isn’t embracing MLG’s EVs: The employees in her own administration won’t drive them, either. Through yet another open records request, I found that in 2022 state employees drove 16,650,964 miles doing their work all over New Mexico. Yet only 36,077 of those miles were driven on the state fleet of EVs, or a whopping 0.21%. It’s clear neither the public nor state employees are flocking to EVs.

Proponents of the governor’s forced mandate may argue those numbers are the exact reason for her new rules. In order to save the planet, we must start somewhere, they say. The problem with that argument is the assumption that New Mexicans can’t choose an EV right now, which of course they can. In fact, those vehicles enjoy lucrative government kickbacks to incentivize their purchase, something their internal combustion counterparts don’t receive.

Despite all the financial incentives and fawning press, still less than 1% of New Mexicans own EVs. That’s why the governor must take the step to force them on us.

This is another misguided proposal with arbitrary goals and arbitrary deadlines, but with real consequences. The lack of choice means the cost of vehicles will rise on New Mexico’s families. All of it begs the obvious question: If the governor’s EVs are so wonderful and so popular, why are new government mandates required at all?