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GREG CUNNINGHAM PROVES IT AGAIN! OF COURSE EMBRACED
BY OTHER REPUBLICANS!
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Cunningham’s New Ad Says ICE Should Spare Families. His Record Says “Collateral Damage.”
Four weeks before Election Day, the New Mexico Republican is campaigning on the enforcement record he spent the summer defending.
WASHINGTON — In August, Greg Cunningham said the immigrants swept up in ICE home and workplace raids were “collateral damage.” Now he is on New Mexico television, in a spot co-produced with the National Republican Congressional Committee, promising that his immigration enforcement would leave “families following the legal process” alone.
The ad, “Keeping NM Safe,” first logged by AdImpact on Oct. 2, is the clearest sign yet that the Republican challenger to Rep. Gabe Vasquez, D-N.M., sees his deportation record as a liability in a swing district along the border. That district includes the Otero County Processing Center, an ICE detention facility Cunningham has fought to keep open. The ad does not mention it.
The Ad
Cunningham opens the 30-second spot on his police-detective résumé. Then he turns to Vasquez, who he says “sides with criminals and supports defunding the police.” No source for that claim appears on screen.
Nine seconds later comes the pivot. Cunningham promises to fix “our broken immigration system” by “focusing on criminals, cartels, and gang members, not families following the legal process.”
What He Said Before the Ad
Cunningham’s record from before the ad reads differently.
As Migrant Insider first reported Aug. 7, Cunningham said of undocumented people caught up in raids: “They got to go, so they are collateral damage to a system that put ICE in the position where they have to go locate this person.” The Santa Fe New Mexican confirmed the context three days later.
On a district podcast, he discussed Renee Good and Alex Pretti, the two U.S. citizens killed by federal agents in Minneapolis. He called them “ideologically opposed … intent on disrupting,” and said “you do not have the right to actively interfere with law enforcement … and that’s what happened in both cases.”
Source NM asked him Sept. 29 whether he backed the Legislature’s push to bar public entities from contracting with ICE for detention, including at Otero. He said: “I don’t support that. … They want that facility. They need that facility for their community, for jobs, for opportunity, for stability.”
His complaint about the raids, he told the Washington Reporter on Sept. 16, is not about who ICE arrests. It is about where: “If we would just allow ICE to work at the jail level like they’re supposed to, we would eliminate a lot of what you’re seeing right now.”
President Donald Trump endorsed Cunningham on June 1. In the Truth Social post, he promised to “Stop Migrant Crime” and accused Vasquez of wanting to “stop deporting Criminal Illegal Aliens.” In September, Cunningham spoke at the RNC’s Midterm Convention.
The Bill Behind “Sides With Criminals”
Groups backing Cunningham have tied the “criminals” attack to Vasquez’s cosponsorship of H.R. 1589, the American Dream and Promise Act of 2025. That bill would open a path to conditional permanent residency for Dreamers brought to the U.S. as children and for holders of Temporary Protected Status and Deferred Enforced Departure.
The bill’s text does not extend that path to criminals. Anyone convicted of “any felony offense” is ineligible. So is anyone with three or more misdemeanors, other than traffic, cannabis and civil-disobedience offenses, and anyone with a misdemeanor domestic violence conviction. Recent gang offenses disqualify an applicant. Every applicant must clear “security and law enforcement background checks.” Conditional status can be revoked from anyone who later runs afoul of those bars.
More than 4,000 DACA recipients live in New Mexico.
Who ICE Is Actually Holding
Cunningham’s ad describes an enforcement system aimed at “criminals, cartels, and gang members.” The numbers describe a different one.
As of July 11, 46,436 of the 65,765 people in ICE detention, or 70.6%, had no criminal conviction, according to TRAC at Syracuse University. When detention hit its record of 70,766 people on Jan. 24, 74.2% had no conviction. “Since the summer, nearly all of the growth in ICE detention has come from people without criminal convictions or charges,” Syracuse researcher Austin Kocher told Stateline in February.
The facility Cunningham wants to keep open in Otero County is not a jail for cartel bosses. It is an immigration detention center. And in centers like it across the country, seven in 10 of the people inside have never been convicted of anything.
Cunningham is hoping New Mexico voters forget what he said in August. We don’t forget. Subscribe and Migrant Insider will keep the receipts on every candidate rewriting his deportation record before November.
Attack ads flood New Mexico's 2nd Congressional District ahead of pivotal election
With Election Day approaching, attack ads targeting Democrat Gabe Vasquez and Republican Greg Cunningham are saturating New Mexico's 2nd Congressional District, a race experts say could influence the balance of power in Congress.
As Election Day nears, attack ads are flooding New Mexico's 2nd Congressional District, targeting both incumbent Democrat Gabe Vasquez and Republican challenger Greg Cunningham in a race experts describe as critical to the balance of power in Congress.
One ad against Vasquez claims, "Vazquez pushed to give illegal immigrants convicted of crimes from drunk driving to assault to child sexual abuse a pathway to citizenship." Target 7 found this claim to be misleading. The ad references House Resolution 1589, also known as the American Dream and Promise Act, which Vasquez supported. The bill seeks to grant conditional permanent residency to certain long-term undocumented residents but excludes convicted felons and individuals with three or more misdemeanor convictions within five years of the application date. While all child sex abuse crimes are felonies in New Mexico, this is not the case in every state. The bill also includes a provision allowing officials to make public safety determinations for applicants with any criminal convictions.
In an ad targeting Cunningham, it is claimed, "Cunningham said he would absolutely be an extremist if elected, and was hand-picked by Trump to run for office." Target 7 verified the first claim as true. In a recorded interview with conservative podcaster Arik Kotkowski, Cunningham recounted a conversation with his mother, during which he confirmed he would "absolutely" be an extremist if he ran for office. However, the second claim was found to be false. While Cunningham received an endorsement from former President Donald Trump, it came months after he had officially launched his campaign.
The ads were funded by two political action committees (PACs): CHC BOLD PAC and No Going Back PAC. CHC BOLD PAC, the main fundraiser for the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, has been active for 25 years, while No Going Back PAC was created this year and shares a treasurer with Trump's super PAC, MAGA Inc. Federal Election Commission filings reveal that No Going Back PAC has spent $274,000 on attack ads against Vasquez and $313,000 on mailers supporting Cunningham. Meanwhile, CHC BOLD PAC has spent over $655,000 on attack ads against Cunningham. Combined, the two PACs have spent more than $1.2 million on this race.
Brian Sanderoff, KOAT's political expert, explained the significance of this district, saying, "If just three seats were to flip from Democrat to Republican, the entire control, balance of power, in Congress would change."
He also highlighted the district's competitiveness, stating, "The first time, Gabe Vasquez won by less than one percentage point. And the second time, he won by four percentage points. So that shows you how competitive this district is."
The campaigns for both Rep. Vasquez's re-election and Greg Cunningham released statements to Target 7 regarding the claims made in the attack ads against them. You can read them below:
Statement from Rep. Gabe Vasquez's Campaign:
“This latest ad — which was paid for by Trump’s dark money group, No Going Back PAC — lies about Gabe’s record, and Gabe is 100% opposed to pathways to citizenship for individuals who have violent criminal records, including offenses such as assault and child sexual abuse."
"Gabe supports commonsense pathways to citizenship for folks who work hard, play by the rules, and adhere to the law.” - Patricia Socarras Santiago, campaign spokesperson
Statement from Greg Cunningham's Campaign:
"This is what desperation looks like. Gabe Vasquez and his DC Democrat buddies are lying about Marine veteran and 20-year police officer Greg Cunningham because they know Vasquez has nothing to show for his four years in Congress. Greg answers to New Mexicans, not Washington, and that's exactly why DC Democrat Gabe Vasquez and his party bosses are terrified of him.” - Spokesman, Greg Cunningham for Congress
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