On March 8, the New Mexico House Judiciary Committee defeated HB 79 on a tie vote of 6-6. It would have allowed independent voters to vote in partisan primaries.
See this story, which has an account of the defeat of this bill, as well as bills to allow fusion and to expand ranked choice voting.
There are other potential good ideas that no legislator in New Mexico seems to think about. New Mexico is the only state in which a ballot-qualified party that nominates by convention is forced to submit a petition for each of its non-presidential nominees. Thus, the number of people who appear on the ballot for the Green and Constitution Parties is very low, because those are ballot-qualified parties that nominate by convention.
Also the independent candidate petition requirement in New Mexico, 2% of the last gubernatorial vote (except for president) is far too high. New Mexico has never had an independent candidate for U.S. Senate or Governor on its ballot.
Abolish the primaries and have all parties nominate by convention. Problem solved. Why should independent and minor party voters have our earnings extorted to pay for the Republicans’ and Democrats’ political procedures? Or, close the primaries and make the Republicans and Democrats foot the ENTIRE bill.