Martinez loses top point man
Communications director departs as administration heads into final 18 months
One of the more prominent faces of Gov. Susana Martinez’s administration during her second term has resigned. Chris Sanchez, the two-term Republican’s communications director since April 2015, left the administration this week.
Larry Behrens, an aide to the governor and a former spokesman for the administration’s Education and Energy departments, will take his place.
Sanchez’s departure is just the latest change for an administration approaching its final 18 months as Martinez prepares to leave office at the end of 2018.
On Thursday, Public Education Secretary Hanna Skandera announced she will step down later this month, leaving the administration with few of its original Cabinet members.
And longtime adviser and former press secretary Scott Darnell resigned in April as deputy chief of staff. Martinez said Sanchez will be missed. “Chris is a gifted communicator who helped me lay out my vision to the people of New Mexico,” she said in a statement. “We’re going to miss his good sense of humor and invaluable insight.”
As spokesman, Sanchez was in many ways the point man for an administration that has taken a combative tone
with Democratic lawmakers and virtually all comers, helping drive New Mexico politics toward a Washington-style partisanship.
Sanchez was usually unapologetic. Even when the governor’s re-election campaign received national attention after the emergence of old, unflattering recordings in which the governor used profane language to refer to a political opponent, Sanchez was on the attack, firing off acerbic statements dismissing the governor’s detractors.
Despite the bombast, the administration also has sought to tightly control its message, with Martinez shrinking from the media in recent years and spokesmen across state government deferring to the Governor’s Office when questioned by reporters. News organizations have accused the administration of stonewalling journalists by ignoring emails and phone calls and resisting public-records requests.
Sanchez was in charge of the administration’s messaging from around the beginning of Martinez’s second term, as speculation mounted that she might seek national office. But the governor’s next steps are now unclear. Her approval ratings have slid and scandals have rocked the administration, such as the resignation of her top tax official amid a criminal investigation and the governor’s own recorded confrontation with police dispatchers and hotel employees over complaints about a rowdy holiday party her office hosted.
Before joining the governor’s staff, Sanchez worked as spokesman for the Republican caucus in the state House of Representatives. He is also a veteran of Republican campaigns in New Mexico, including Martinez’s 2014 re-election bid, Heather Wilson’s run for the U.S. Senate in 2012 and Allen Weh’s 2010 gubernatorial campaign. Martinez defeated Weh and three others in the primary election.
Sanchez worked as a spokesman for the state Higher Education Department in late 2013 and early 2014. He also was editor of The University of New Mexico’s Daily Lobo.
“It has been an honor to serve the governor of my home state,” he said in a statement. “She is an empathetic leader who cares deeply about our future, and she is passionate about the work she does.”
Sanchez was paid an annual salary of nearly $81,000.
Behrens is a graduate of Sam Houston State University and worked as a reporter for KOAT-TV as well as an anchor for KKOB-AM. He worked as communications director for the House Republicans during the 2011 legislative session and joined the Martinez administration that year as spokesman for the Public Education Department.
Behrens landed at the center of controversy while spokesman for the Public Education Department. He had compiled a list of non-union teachers for the governor’s administration. Behrens maintained he was merely fulfilling a public-records request. But critics said his action amounted to public employees performing political work on taxpayers’ time. And by sending the list to the education secretary’s private email account, he perhaps inadvertently revealed how the administration had been using private accounts to communicate.
Behrens takes over during what is usually a quiet stretch for an outgoing administration. Though Martinez has been locked in a standoff with Democratic lawmakers over the state’s finances for about the last year, a 30-day budget session early next year is likely the governor’s last opportunity to advance a legislative agenda.
Meanwhile, Democrats already are angling to win back back the governor’s office. No Republican has formally launched a campaign to succeed Martinez, but the presumptive front-runner, U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce of Hobbs, appears poised to run away from her record.