I wonder if this had anything to do with today’s hearing in Donk v. Grisham being delayed by the judge late Monday afternoon. Maybe Grisham needed some extra time to find an attorney actually willing to defend her unconstitutional “emergency” order banning open and concealed carry in Albuquerque? Too bad for her that Saul Goodman is a fictional character because it sounds like she could use a good “criminal” attorney right about now.

BREAKING: New Mexico Attorney General tells the Governor that he won't defend her carry ban, saying "I do not believe it passes constitutional muster." pic.twitter.com/ORat27wAvn

— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) September 12, 2023

So, not only will Raul Torrez not prosecute those gun owners who are carrying in defiance of Grisham’s order, he won’t be defending the governor in any of the lawsuits that have already been filed in response to her unconstitutional edict.

“Though I recognize my statutory obligation as New Mexico’s chief legal officer to defend state officials when they are sued in their official capacity, my duty to uphold and defend the constitutional rights of every citizen takes precedence,” Torrez’s letter stated. “Simply put, I do not believe that the Emergency Order will have any meaningful impact on public safety but, more importantly, I do not believe it passes constitutional muster.”

Torrez shared his anger and frustration about survivors and victims of gun violence.

“The tragic deaths of 5-year-old Galilea Samaniego in a recent drive-by shooting and 11-year-old Froylan Villegas in a road rage incident should serve as a wakeup call to everyone,” Torrez said in the letter. “I encourage you to engage in a more thoughtful and deliberative process with members of the New Mexico Legislature rather than taking unilateral action that infringes on the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens while having little if any discernible impact on the underlying dynamics driving gun violence in our community.”

That’s a polite way of saying that not only is what the governor doing squarely unconstitutional, it’s also decidedly unsound from a public safety perspective. Concealed carry holders (and those who openly carry a firearm) aren’t driving the high rates of violence in Albuquerque. Instead, we’re talking mainly about drug and gang-fueled violence, and the governor herself has already admitted that she doesn’t expect criminals to abide by her proclamation not to carry a gun.

I asked yesterday if Grisham had an actual end game in mind, given that her edict has been met with such bipartisan disapproval and outright opposition. I’m starting to wonder if this isn’t a ham-fisted attempt to prod the Democratic majority in the statehouse to give her what she was demanding in the legislative session this year; a ban on so-called assault weapons, raising the age to purchase a firearm to 21, and imposing a 14-day waiting period. The governor had threatened to call lawmakers back to Santa Fe for a special session when her proposals failed to get to her desk (in most cases being passed over or killed in committee), but backed off when it became clear that there was no appetite for her gun control agenda even among her fellow Democrats.

The problem with that theory is that Grisham is even weaker now than she was during the session. Acting unilaterally, without the support of the state officials who are charged with enforcing and defending her order as well as the local law enforcement where the ban is supposedly in effect, has left Grisham out on a limb. New Mexico Democrats aren’t exactly rallying to her cause, major gun control groups like Giffords have studiously avoided any comment on her order on social media, and even anti-gun activists like David Hogg have cried foul over her proclamation.

Grisham’s attempted end run around the Constitution is an affront to the rule of law and the individual rights of lawful gun owners who live in or visit Bernalillo County and Albuquerque, but it’s also shaping up to be the biggest political miscalculation in New Mexico politics in decades. Grisham expected that her fellow Democrats would once again rally to her cause, only to learn that most of them are smart enough to know how toxic her order is from both a political and legal perspective.

With Torrez declining to defend her order or pursue anyone who violates it, it’s unclear what enforcement mechanism actually remains for the governor. She maintains the state police will be sending out citations to those caught carrying, including those who attended a Second Amendment rally in Old Town last week, but what agency is going to pursue the matter when gun owners refuse to pay up? It won’t be the Attorney General or the Bernalillo County District Attorney, and that leaves Grisham looking not only like a tyrant, but a fool as well.