Michelle Lujan Grisham is the thirty-second governor of New Mexico and the first Democratic Latina to be elected governor in U.S. history. In November 2022, she was re-elected to a second term by defeating Republican Mark Ronchetti. She previously served as the U.S. Representative for New Mexico's 1st congressional district from 2013 to 2019.

Lujan Grisham was born in 1959 in Los Alamos, New Mexico, and grew up in Santa Fe. She is a 12th-generation New Mexican, and many of her family members have served in elected and appointed positions in government. She received a Bachelor of Arts in university studies from the University of New Mexico in 1981 and a Juris Doctor from the University of New Mexico School of Law in 1987.

Become a Subscriber

Please purchase a subscription to continue reading this article.

Subscribe Now

Early in her political career, Lujan Grisham served as the director of the New Mexico Aging and Long-Term Services Department. She also held two state Cabinet positions: New Mexico Secretary of Aging from 2002 to 2004 and New Mexico Secretary of Health from 2004 to 2007. In these roles, she was an advocate for senior citizens, veterans, and the disabled. She was later elected to the Bernalillo County Commission, serving from 2010 to 2012.

After being elected to Congress, Lujan Grisham worked tirelessly to support local tribes, equal pay for women, public schools, public lands, and veterans’ healthcare. She was selected as the chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus in 2016 and used her position to speak out against reactionary federal anti-immigrant policies.

Lujan Grisham resigned from her House seat on December 31, 2018, to assume the governorship of New Mexico the following day. In 2019, she announced a plan to make public universities in New Mexico tuition-free to state residents. She spent much of her first term leading the state through the COVID-19 pandemic, implementing aggressive public health restrictions on businesses, suspending in-class learning, and promoting vaccinations.

Lujan Grisham’s re-election ensures that New Mexico will continue to move in a progressive direction, drawing support from abortion-rights groups, teachers’ union leaders, and recent visits from U.S. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.

“The weather forecast in New Mexico is four more years — four more years of progress, four more years of rebuilding, four more years of fighting for students and educators,” Lujan Grisham said in her victory speech to supporters in Albuquerque.