Top lawmakers want to overhaul harassment policy
Top state lawmakers announced Wednesday that they plan to overhaul the New Mexico Legislature’s policy on harassment by the end of January, outlining a framework for rewriting rules adopted nearly a decade ago.
The bipartisan plan is supposed to answer concerns about how sexual harassment is handled in government amid a swell of misconduct allegations in recent weeks involving prominent men in politics and the media around the country.
The Legislature adopted its policy in 2008, but just last week, a Republican member of the state House of Representatives wrote a pointed critique of the rules, describing them as a “joke” and suggesting that harassment is part of being a woman at the state Capitol.
“My hope is that this effort doesn’t just result in a policy change, but in a cultural change at the Roundhouse,” House Speaker Brian Egolf, D-Santa Fe, said in the announcement signed by top Democrats and Republicans in both chambers of the Legislature. “If we want our state to be safe and inclusive, then we must make the halls of the Roundhouse safe and inclusive for all who work or visit there.”
Democratic and Republican leaders in the state House and Senate will appoint a working group to review the current policy alongside outside lawyers. They will draft a new policy in time for a December meeting of the Legislative Council, a group of lawmakers responsible for day-to-day operations of the Legislature. Following public input and suggestions, the committee might approve a new policy during its meeting in January.
Legislators said they want to create a policy that will apply not only to lawmakers and staff but also contractors, lobbyists and other outside vendors.
The announcement also said the policy would thoroughly “protect the accuser from any form of retaliation” and ensure updated, comprehensive training is available.
The Legislature’s policy on harassment is coming under scrutiny after Democratic gubernatorial candidate Michelle Lujan Grisham told The Associated Press earlier this month that she believes Sen. Michael Padilla should drop out of the race for lieutenant governor because of years-old harassment lawsuits. Padilla, D-Albuquerque, has not been publicly accused of any wrongdoing during his five years as a state senator.
On Friday, Rep. Kelly Fajardo, R-Belen, wrote an open letter to top lawmakers, urging them to overhaul the 2008 policy. She wrote that she had been harassed and knew of “sickening quid pro quo propositions where legislators offered political support in exchange for sexual favors.”
Fajardo wrote that the existing policy only seems to apply to staff, not legislators or lobbyists, which she said are
“frequent targets of harassment.”
Several sentences in the twopage policy are dedicated to the consequences of filing a false report, but only one short line prohibits retaliating against anyone who files a report, Fajardo wrote.
Fajardo called for a proposed independent ethics committee to investigate complaints or at least turn them over to outside attorneys.
The statement Wednesday did not go that far, but it remains unclear exactly what shape the new policy might take.