Tuesday's primary elections in New Mexico are likely to test how much power Former President Donald Trump still has is in the Republican Party, as five GOP candidates are battling it out for the chance to run for governor against Democratic incumbent Michelle Lujan Grisham.
The Republican field includes Mark Ronchetti, a former TV meteorologist, state Rep. Rebecca Dow, Greg Zanetti, Jay Block and Ethel Maharg.
Lujan Grisham is running for her second term as governor of New Mexico. Every elected position in the state is currently held by a Democrat, according to KUNM.
According to an Albuquerque Journal poll that was published on May 22, Ronchetti was the favorite to win the GOP primary with 45% of Republican voters saying they would vote for him.
Dow was second with 17% of the vote, while Zanetti, Block and Maharg all had less than 10% of votes in the poll. 21% of the voters in the poll said they were undecided and had not decided who they were going to vote for on June 7.
Ronchetti ran for Senate in 2020 and lost to Democratic Sen. Ben Ray Luján, but received 46% of the votes. He notably outperformed Trump in New Mexico during the 2020 election, as the former president received just 43.5% of the state's votes.
Trump has not endorsed any of the Republican candidates in New Mexico, according to BallotPedia, although he has been a topic among Ronchetti and Dow leading up to the primary election.
Dow said she is "a lifelong conservative who's never disrespected President Donald Trump" during a debate on local news station KOAT. She then called out Ronchetti in an ad campaign and said he is a "Never Trumper." Dow also pointed towards a comment Ronchetti made during a 2019 climate change event at the University of New Mexico, which he said he "used to be a Republican until the orange one," according to KUNM.
"Mark Ronchetti was caught on camera, more than once, revealing his true ideals, so he has no other option than to deflect his continued mocking of President Trump as a joke," Dow told the Albuquerque Journal in April.
In response to Dow claiming Ronchetti isn't a Republican, he said on his website that he's still a registered Republican and only made the joke because he was at a college campus. Ronchetti has also called out Dow over voting to approve pandemic relief aid in New Mexico, which had bipartisan support.
The two Republican candidates have both said they support Trump's idea of a wall at the border, and have promised to send the National Guard back to the border if elected.
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