Fighters for LGBTQ Liberation, the time is upon us again - Elections are coming up!
Folks across the state will be voting this November, for Mayors, City Councilors, and School Board Members. And Equality New Mexico will be doing our part to help elect people who will fight for LGBTQ Liberation!
Before we jump in and begin to endorse candidates for these offices - we wanted to just remind our members and friends what this process looks like and what our values are in this fight.
Process:
EQNM Has formed an Endorsement Committee, with the best representation we can get from across the state in our various communities. We seek to bring the voices of rural NM as well as Albuquerque and Santa Fe. We work to bring Queer, Trans, Nonbinary, Black and Indigenous, and People of Color into this conversation because our community is multi-racial, multi-generational, and multi-issue!
Candidates are asked first to submit a questionnaire, developed by this committee, to respond to a number of questions about our values. Once the questionnaire is submitted, the committee reviews it and then invites some (if not all) candidates to engage in an interview. The interview with the entire Endorsement Committee is an opportunity to clarify and elaborate on the answers in the questionnaires.
The Endorsement Committee then deliberates and decides on recommendations for endorsement. Once they have recommended candidates for endorsement, the Board of Equality New Mexico will vote officially whether or not to endorse the candidate(s).
Our Values:
While EQNM feels strongly that representation from our community for our community is critical - we know that more LGBTQ voices in public offices are necessary to further our liberation - we can’t ignore that not all voices from our community will represent our liberation well. So we ask candidates about a number of issues that impact LGBTQ New Mexicans.
Queer and Trans people live in every community, are part of every family, and work in every job in the state. So our community is impacted by issues from healthcare, to economic stability, from education to policing and criminal “justice” policies.
We work toward Reproductive, Economic, and broad Social Justice policies. We think about policies regarding policing and incarceration, healthcare access, education, immigration, and nondiscrimination.
As our endorsement committee begins to do this work, we wanted to make sure our members know about this process, and how and why we make these decisions. We will continue to strive to be transparent and accountable to our community.