{"id":46213,"date":"2025-01-10T16:02:06","date_gmt":"2025-01-10T23:02:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newmexicopbs.org\/productions\/newmexicoinfocus\/?p=46213"},"modified":"2025-01-10T16:02:09","modified_gmt":"2025-01-10T23:02:09","slug":"for-the-turnstiles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newmexicopbs.org\/productions\/newmexicoinfocus\/for-the-turnstiles\/","title":{"rendered":"For the Turnstiles"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\"Two<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Alexander Uballez tossed his name in the hat to lead the U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office for the District of New Mexico in 2020 after spending four years as a line prosecutor in federal court. It took a couple of years \u2014 the Senate confirmation process is an impenetrable bramble of bureaucratic bickering in this cursed political age \u2014 but he finally got the nod in May 2022.\u00a0

Uballez signed a four-year commission and went to work on a slate of anti-violent-crime, tribal-relationship-building and other initiatives \u2014 all while dragging the office from the Gutenberg era of paper-only files into the world of e-litigation, where much of the country\u2019s federal cop shops already live. \u00a0
Uballez likens the work of a U.S. Attorney to that of King David: laying the first bricks of a temple to God, knowing all along that the work will be left for Solomon to complete. He\u2019d have had a bit more time to build\u00a0were it not for the aforementioned curse.\u00a0

I\u2019ll do the math, so you don\u2019t have to: A four-year commission, signed in May 2022, would expire in May 2026. But it ain\u2019t going down like that.\u00a0

Instead, Uballez is eyeballing his wristwatch, waiting for Inauguration Day, when Donald Trump will saunter back into the White House and, unless division suddenly becomes unity or some other cosmic inversion occurs, either fire Uballez or offer him the chance to resign. \u00a0

Americans have come to expect these Game-of-Thrones<\/em>-style, quadrennial Red Weddings in U.S. Attorney\u2019s offices around the nation as de rigueur<\/em>, though they are in fact a somewhat more recently begun tradition of bloodsport. (Ronald Reagan was the first true aficionado of this Justice Department lion-feeding exercise.)\u00a0

The politicization of these positions is where Uballez and I began an exit interview of sorts for this week\u2019s episode of New Mexico in Focus. We returned to that theme a few times, unspooling the past and present of weaponized federal law enforcement and a handful of what Uballez sees as common misperceptions about government service.\u00a0

We spelunked several other caves, too, including the root causes \u2014 and some potential fixes \u2014 of the violence that continues to plague Albuquerque and other New Mexico cities; what might come after Trump drops the ax for a guy who\u00a0talks about equities instead of privileges, about accused criminals and taxpayers alike as clients of the U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office in court, yet made a career as a prosecutor; and what he\u2019d write in a letter to whoever takes the job next.\u00a0

We spoke for nearly 50 minutes and, afterward, the NMiF crew and I decided to break tradition and air the whole conversation on this week\u2019s show. That\u2019s unusual for us, but this felt worth viewers\u2019 time. We hope you\u2019ll agree. (We broke it into three parts to let everyone catch their breath a few times. You can watch the first<\/a>, second<\/a> and third<\/a> parts on YouTube.) \u00a0

Uballez appeared on NMiF for the first time in 2023 for a conversation<\/a> about his background and his approach to the job with correspondent Russell Contreras. He came back last March to discuss<\/a> a criminal investigation his office is leading into alleged corruption within the Albuquerque Police Department\u2019s DWI Unit. \u00a0

I wrote after that second interview<\/a> how unusual it was for someone in Uballez\u2019 position to speak publicly about such a sensitive matter. \u00a0

We touched on that corruption investigation again this week \u2014 to date, no one has been charged, but Uballez says he has a timeline for when the probe will conclude, and he maintains that the public should expect a full accounting regardless of the end result and no matter who sits\u00a0in his office after he leaves. \u00a0

I asked him why.\u00a0

\u201cI think it\u2019s important for folks to understand that this is not a mystery institution. This is a lot of why I like to come and talk with you and speak with reporters,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is why I have a policy of never saying, \u2018No comment,\u2019 unless I absolutely have to. It\u2019s because people have a right to understand who we are and what we are doing \u2014 and to ask questions of it. We\u2019re not going to answer every question, but we should at least be able to tell you why we can\u2019t answer it. And so, for the people here: Know that your U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office is full of people just like you who care just as much as you do about this community.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s hoping that whoever Trump taps as New Mexico\u2019s next top federal cop will be as open to demystifying such a historically opaque institution as Uballez has been.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

-Jeff Proctor, Executive Producer<\/p>\n\n\n\n