The Texas Office of the Attorney General informed state lawmakers on Wednesday that Texas was lawfully veto a portion of New Mexico, though it may not be possible.
People of the Texas House Select Committee on Governmental Oversight discussed the benefits and drawbacks of adding some New Mexican counties to Texas after discussions on judicial dignity and securing taxpayer funds were extended a 9 a.m. reading into the night. Texas Republicans emphasized the potential benefits of uniting oil producers in the Permian Basin, despite the fact that more than one part made jokes about the concept’s unlikely origin. The debate started in the New Mexico House of Representatives.
In early this year, state representatives from New Mexico, Randal Pettigrew and Jimmy Mason, submitted a <a href="https://www.nmlegis.gov/Sessions/26%20Regular/resolutions/house/HJR10.html”>constitutional amendment that would have led to a state independence vote. Secession may allow the counties with the Democratic-dominated state government to break away from the more traditional, traditional counties in New Mexico, according to Pettigrew.
The U.S. Constitution allows states to switch land, and similar agreements have already taken place, according to Michael Cotton, Texas Attorney General’s chief of specific litigation.
Cotton cited recent cessions from Minnesota to North Dakota in 1961 as examples, noting that “border states you agree to change their respective boundaries.”
State Representative Ellen Troxclair (R-Lakeway ) blasted,” So you’re saying there’s a chance.”
State Representative Brooks Landgraf (R-Odessa ), whose district includes two West Texas counties bordering New Mexico, acknowledged the proposal’s improbability but called the discussion “important” for the state’s energy issues.
The Permian Basin, which supplies a sizable portion of the country’s fuel, extends into New Mexico. Oil and natural gas recovery produces produced waters, which Texas operators frequently reinject into the ground, making it difficult to find geological exercise and other issues, according to Landgraf.
The State of New Mexico in the Permian Basin, also, nationwide, has a law that forbids the treatment of produced water back into the ground.” One dirty little secret that nobody talks on… But think where all the water that was produced ends up? Landgraf claimed that the liquid is being “being trucked in, piped in, and being reinjected into the Texas part of the Permian Basin” and that it is “being sent in, piped in, and being reinjected into Texas.”
” I’m not under any illusion that this is a good scenario, or that it’s also useful in a lot of cases,” Landgraf said.” I do believe one reason why this conversation is important is that even if we don’t move a state boundary line, we need to find some way to make this work together,” he said.
State Representative Erin Zwiener (D-San Marcos ), who joked that heavily Democratic El Paso County would be willing to trade itself to New Mexico, described the subject as “one of the stranger issues that comes up in the Legislature.”
More importantly, Zwiener said,” I’m very worried about how having this conversation will affect our connection with the State of New Mexico.”
