The New Mexico law defining which groups are qualified political parties is one of the muddiest such laws in the nation. However, the New Mexico Secretary of State seems very likely to agree that the Green Party is a qualified party, entitled to its own primary, based on the party’s 45% vote for Public Regulation Commission last month. The law requires a vote of 5% for “any” office, but the 5% is calculated with the presidential total vote as the denominator. That has caused some to believe that only the vote for president counts, although a reasonable person would interpret “any office” to mean just that, any partisan office.

The Secretary of State’s office says that it can’t be certain the Green Party is ballot-qualified until the new voter registration data comes out. The law requires that a major party meet not only the vote test, but it must also have one-third of 1% of the registration, as members. However, the Green Party is extremely likely to meet this test also, since in October 2008 it had .44% of the total registration.