“That means any public debate over the fairness or unfairness of the state income tax is fact-free,” Bradley said. “The only people who can have an informed position are people at the Tax department.”
Advocates of the Medicaid expansion, such as Bill Jordan of New Mexico Voices for Children, worry that the department will have to cut services to keep up with the enrollment demand. “Both of the proposed budgets have over $100 million of cost containment built in,” Jordan said.
Veronica Garcia, executive director of the advocacy group New Mexico Voices for Children, said research shows early childhood education programs benefit the economy in the long term. She also noted that the state regularly ranks near the bottom on child well-being.
New Mexico Voices for Children became the latest group to criticize the diversion, saying the amount of money spent on it could better be spent in other ways in the state, citing a potential $1 billion cost.
A liberal policy group, New Mexico Voices for Children, charged that Martinez’s reductions made “corporations a higher priority” than the state’s “working families and their children.”