Jonas Moya, the former executive director of the Farm Service Agency in New Mexico has announced he will be running in the Democratic primary for Commissioner of Public Lands in the 2026 election. Moya shared why he's running with Anthony Moreno.
Transcript:
Anthony Moreno: Jonas, thanks for joining us. Can you start off by just sharing with us why you are running for land Commissioner?
Jonas Moya: Well, first of all, thank you so much for having me on. So, this is actually wasn't in my 5-year plan. Just recently, you know, after I left the Biden Harris administration with the change administration, I looked deep into my resume and my experience and my passion for rural New Mexico, and that drove me to decide to run for Public Land Commissioner. I think I'm very experienced. At my time with the Farm Service Agency. I managed 75 employees with offices throughout the state and a multimillion-dollar budget. So with that experience coupled with my advocacy work and my policy experience in agriculture, I said, you know what, why can't I take these learned experiences to the land office? I think I'll be a good fit.
Anthony Moreno: If elected, what are some of the issues that you would like to address?
Jonas Moya: Well, first of all, the Land office has been doing a great job. So I want to continue the great work that the Land Office is doing. I know over the last course of probably 8 years, the revenues have more than doubled and I really think oil and gas also for that. We've been really lucky to be in New Mexico, but I want to continue that momentum. I want to continue that momentum forward, continue to strive to make sure that we're getting the most for our public lands, but keeping stewardship and customer service in the forefront. So when the immediate action items that I would like to do is customer service, making sure that the Land Office is approachable and then slowly working with working groups to identify trends and challenges that we need to work on, whether they're policy related or administrative related, you know I have the experience to get it done.
Anthony Moreno: How do you plan on getting these issues that you brought up done if you are in that role?
Jonas Moya: That's a great question. I'm big on bipartisan work. I like to work with both sides of the aisle to make sure that we're getting the best for the, for the public and for New Mexicans that we can get done. So, I'm going to work my hardest to bring everybody to the table, farmers, ranchers, industry leaders. Whether they're from local economies or from the energy sector, I want to bring them to the table, and talk about issues, and see what we could do to work together to make sure that we're having appropriate recreational use of our public lands, where there's public access to them as well as good stewardship, well, maximizing the profits on that land as well, to make sure that we can continue to fund rural hospitals, schools and every other beneficiary from public lands.
Anthony Moreno: Jonas Moya is the Democratic candidate running for land commissioner in New Mexico. Jonas, thanks for joining us.
Jonas Moya: Absolutely. Thank you for having me.
