Free Republic

FBI statistics reveal which states lead in violent and property crime, while Washington, D.C., outpaces them all. In August of this year, the FBI released its final state and local crime statistics for 2025. I was unable to find any online articles ranking states by violent crime and property crime based on the new numbers, so I did it myself in hopes that some AT readers might find it interesting or useful. All the information can be accessed at the FBI’s Crime Data Explorer site, then “Documents and Downloads,” then “Crime in the U.S. Annual Reports,” then “2025 CIUS Estimations,”...

Driving the backroads of southeastern Arizona, where scrubland stretches in every direction, Chiricahua juts out of the landscape like a geological plot twist. Part of the Sky Islands, mountain ranges spanning from southeastern Arizona to southwestern New Mexico and into northern Mexico, the Chiricahuas are home to dramatic elevation changes and rich biodiversity. “Coatimundi crossing” signs dot the roadsides, warning drivers to watch for this ring-tailed, long-snouted raccoon cousin, and even the occasional jaguar is known to prowl the region. The Chiricahua Mountains also hold cultural and historical significance as part of the ancestral homeland of the Apache. As an...

A judge and the state AG say Facebook didn’t block enough political speech.Can one state regulate speech for the other 49? We’re about to find out after a New Mexico judge on Wednesday ordered Meta to pay $25 billion for supposedly misleading the public about its privacy and content moderation policies. Its real offense is not doing more to censor speech that progressives dislike.The $25 billion penalty ranks among the largest court judgments against a single company in U.S. history. Based on the judge’s over-egged rhetoric, you’d think the parent company of Facebook had turned over its platform to sex...

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (CNN) -- About 500 people were evacuated from the New Mexico State Fairgrounds Expo as a precaution Saturday evening after low levels of radiation were detected, police said. A Geiger counter registered the presence of radiation after two objects were discovered at the 236-acre fairgrounds in the heart of Albuquerque, said Lt. Juan Martinez, a spokesman for New Mexico state police.

SAN DIEGO, May 25 (UPI) -- An Internet investment adviser charged with insider trading was being held without bail on a parole violation Saturday after federal prosecutors in San Diego raised questions about a stock-sales order he placed the day before the September terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. Amir "Anthony" Elgindy, 34, of Encinitas, faces charges in New York of allegedly taking part in a stock manipulation and extortion scheme with four other people, including two current and former FBI agents. Prosecutors, however, raised questions during a detention hearing Friday about what he might have known...

The waterway’s decline poses an existential threat to Elephant Butte, N.M., and surrounding farms. ‘This place is going to turn into a ghost town.’ ELEPHANT BUTTE, N.M.—Three decades ago, a rare event drew hundreds of people from miles away to the Elephant Butte reservoir, this state’s largest lake. The reservoir, which supplied drinking water to thousands and nourished vast acres of farmland, had swelled from the Rio Grande and begun to overflow. Jim Paxon remembers the roar as water cascaded down the dam’s spillway, tossing mist into the air and churning the ground below. Those days are long gone. One...

Meta was ordered to pay $25 billion in penalties by a New Mexico court on Wednesday as part of a data privacy case that stemmed from the company’s Cambridge Analytica scandal from nearly a decade ago. The penalty, revealed in a court filing, comes after a jury in a Santa Fe courthouse found in September the social media giant liable for misleading state citizens about how it safeguards and collects user data and prevents harmful information from flourishing on its services. Although the jury concluded that Meta had more than 43 million violations of the state’s unfair practices act, with...

The importance of judicial elections cannot be overstated. The current crime crisis in New Mexico is not solely a criminal or law enforcement issue, it also involves the judiciary. Judges play a significant role in the outcomes of criminal cases and have discretion when it comes to ‘catch and release’ issues that plague our state. Voters should make informed decisions about who is elected and/or who is retained as a judge. Your NO vote is important in that a judge must gain 57% of votes to be retained. This listing shows only judges not recommended for retention. The second listing...

New Mexico should immediately change its name to New America. We are not Mexico, we are the United States of America! The name would add great value and prestige to the State! Home Values and Incomes would rise, and you would be even prouder while saluting our beautiful American Flag! Maybe even the Crooked Elections, that New Mexico is known for, would become honest again! President DONALD J. TRUMP

For all the griping we hear about our state — healthcare, education, crime, economic opportunity — there sure has been a lot of talk lately about ownership of our assets. (Turn the page for opinions about the Sandia Mountains.) Last week, Texas lawmakers met to study the possibility of the Lone Star State annexing “one or more contiguous counties” in southeastern New Mexico because of the region’s conservative leanings and oil production. It’s been a fantastical debate for several years, as southeastern New Mexico residents on paper align more closely to the culture of West Texas than Santa Fe. While...

EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) — Dona Ana County has now issued evacuation orders for five communities after flooding and a warning about “imminent failure” of a dam on Tuesday, Sept. 29. Dona Ana has now issued evaucation orders for Hatch and Placitas on Tuesday evening, adding to previously ordered evacuations for Rincon, Salem and Garfield. Residents and visitors in Hatch, Placitas, Rincon, Salem and Garfield are strongly encouraged to evacuate now and move to a safe location before conditions deteriorate further. Those who need a place to stay can seek shelter at: Radium Springs Community Resource Center 12060 Lindbeck Road...

In an unprecedented legal action, an aborted baby won a wrongful death lawsuit settlement against the abortionist who killed him or her. The estate of a 26-week-old aborted child has collected $200,000 in a New Mexico wrongful-death settlement, in what attorneys on the case call the first payout of its kind to an aborted baby treated as a person under state law. The case, Wabbington v. Boyd, was settled and dismissed with prejudice on Sept. 14. The defendants were late-term abortionist Curtis Wayne Boyd, who then operated as Southwestern Women’s Options; Emily Cohen; and the late Carmen Landau. The complaint...

NEWCOMB, N.M. — Three people are dead after being swept away by floodwaters early Wednesday on the Navajo Nation, authorities said. Tribal police officers received a report around 12:30 a.m. about people being washed away near the community of Newcomb in northwestern New Mexico. The report followed a day of heavy rain that left roadways and other areas flooded with standing water. More rain followed during the overnight hours. Search crews responded and found the bodies of two adults and a child. Authorities did not release any details about the circumstances, other than saying the drownings were under investigation. Navajo...

As construction advances on New Mexico’s first $10 million forced taxpayer-funded abortion killing center in Las Cruces, NM, the New Mexico Alliance for Life (NMAFL) confirms that pro-abortion administrators at the University of New Mexico (UNM), in partnership with state officials, are targeting Las Vegas, NM as the site for the second state-funded abortion killing center. The information comes directly from Christopher Arndt, M.D., Interim President and CEO of the UNM Health Sciences Center, during a 2026 University of New Mexico Board of Regents meeting earlier this year. Discussing the state’s plans for a second facility, Arndt said: “And we...

A defense lawyer appealing his client's murder conviction submitted a brief containing made-up police testimony and witnesses fabricated by OpenAI's ChatGPT, New Mexico's highest court said. The New ‌Mexico Supreme Court on Wednesday fined the attorney, Stephen Aarons, and held him in contempt for failing to verify ‌the accuracy of the court filing, which Aarons said he prepared with help from the AI program. The filing "contained false testimony from wholly fabricated witnesses," ​the court said. The panel also said Aarons had "demonstrated a lack of remorse and a lack of concern for his client." The justices fined Aarons $5,000...

New Mexico Democratic leaders are aggressively pushing back on President Donald Trump’s social media posts about renaming the state of New Mexico as “New America.” “New Mexico’s name isn’t up for debate — it’s been ours since before the United States existed,” New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, said in a post on X featuring an image of the state labeled with “New Mexico.” “While the President tries to distract Americans from his disastrous war in Iran, the price of gas —and everything else — keeps rising. “Under Democratic leadership here in New Mexico, we’re providing families with...

A New Mexico man was arrested on Wednesday after he allegedly arrived at the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Department headquarters with a truck bed full of Flock Safety cameras. “The same man was recently accused of damaging Flock cameras in Rio Rancho,” KOB 4 wrote. Watch below: VIDEOS AT LINK.............. KOB 4 shared further: Authorities arrested Jevon Martinez for damaging Flock cameras in Rio Rancho in May. Then, Wednesday, he posted video on social media appearing to show him driving around Albuquerque and taking down automated license plate readers once again. In those videos, he comments that since the Bernalillo County...

Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains has permanently closed its Northeast Heights abortion facility in Albuquerque. The closure comes just months after the center reopened and resumed killing babies in abortions. A closure notice posted at the site states: “THIS HEALTH CENTER IS PERMANENTLY CLOSED.” The notice directors customers to Planned Parenthood’s Eubank Health Center as of July 13. Abortion Free New Mexico reported on April 9 that the Northeast Heights facility had reopened and begun doing abortions again. The permanent shutdown follows another recent consolidation in the city. In July, Alamo Women’s Clinic closed its Montgomery Boulevard location and...

The Babylon Bee is taking New Mexico to court over a state law that requires warning labels on certain AI-generated political content, arguing the mandate threatens political satire by forcing comedians to explain the joke before readers can laugh. The Christian satire site filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday against New Mexico officials, with backing from Alliance Defending Freedom, challenging provisions of House Bill 182, the 2024 law that amended the state’s Campaign Reporting Act to regulate what it calls “materially deceptive media.” The law requires covered political advertisements that use artificial intelligence to generate or manipulate images, video, or audio...

The Food and Drug Administration this week escalated a recall of 1.6 million cartons of eggs over potential salmonella contamination to its most serious classification. On Wednesday, the FDA designated the incident a "Class 1" recall, which the agency applies to product recalls "in which there is a reasonable probability that the use of or exposure to a violative product will cause serious adverse health consequences or death." The eggs were first recalled on July 22 by North Manchester, Indiana-based Midwest Poultry Services because they could be contaminated with salmonella. The eggs were sold under various brand names at retailers...