Campaign Contributors of Denish & Martinez

    News New Mexico has been doing some digging on followthemoney.org in the hopes of gaining a better sense of how the New Mexico gubernatorial candidates are being financed.  A quick survey of reported contributions through March 2010 shows the Denish campaign relies heavily on lawyers and lobbyists.  This group is by far and away the campaign's largest contributor, both in terms of dollars and number of people and organizations identifying themselves as such. We found the names of about 453 different lawyers or lobbyist organizations that have contributed to the Denish campaign since 2008.  Over the course of her entire political career Denish has collected well over $793,000 in contributions from this group.

    For the GOP nominee, Las Crucen Susan Martinez, it is a somewhat different story.  In sifting through the Martinez campaign contribution records (on followthemoney.org) we found the names of 47 lawyers/lobbyists who have contributed a total of $21,487 to her campaign.  Clearly Martinez, a lawyer and Dona Ana County's D.A. is not yet nearly as popular with members of the legal and lobbying professions. 
    Perhaps time, the polls, and the emphasis of Martinez own fund-raising activities will reveal whether these numbers and percentages regarding the implied influence of lawyers and lobbyists actually change in some meaningful way. For now it seems clear that Denish is much more beholden to this very politically active segment of society.

Campaign Contributors of Denish & Martinez