santafenewmexican.com · Daniel J. Chacón dchacon@sfnewmexican.com · September 9, 2026
Sen. Muñoz accused of lobbying state to help son's company | Local News | santafenewmexican.com
# Sen. Muñoz accused of lobbying state to help son's company
- By Daniel J. Chacón dchacon@sfnewmexican.com
#### Daniel Chacon
Reporter
- Author email (dchacon@sfnewmexican.com) - Sep 8, 2026 - 52 mins ago - 0
Sen. George Muñoz, D-Gallup, chair of the Senate Finance Committee. New Mexican file photo
A powerful state senator and three high-ranking New Mexico Department of Transportation employees have been snared in an ethics complaint accusing the longtime lawmaker of using the "power of his office" to pull strings for his son's pavement marking company.
The administrative complaint filed Friday with the State Ethics Commission against Sen. George Muñoz, a Gallup Democrat who chairs the Senate Finance Committee, and three transportation employees, centers on a call Muñoz supposedly made to District 6 Engineer Lisa Boyd Vega on Nov. 1, 2024.
While the reported call is memorialized in an email Vega wrote, Muñoz said Tuesday he didn't remember making it.
Attorney Jacob Candelaria, a former state senator who filed the complaint and who has been involved in several recent legal complaints against powerful Democratic figures as well as lawsuits involving the universal childcare program, said it's now up to the ethics commission and possibly a court to decide who is telling the truth.
"As far as I can tell, the only person in this situation who has a motivation to lie is Senator Muñoz," he said. "I see no reasonable explanation why the DOT employee who wrote about his phone call would just show up to work one day and make it up."
Vega explained in an email to Rick Padilla, executive director for highway operations, the call from the elder Muñoz involved Prestigious Paving LLC of Gallup. The company, which has seen state transportation payments climb from $2.3 million in fiscal year 2023 to $8.5 million in fiscal year 2026, is owned by one of Muñoz's two sons, Landon.
Vega didn't note the father-son relationship in the email. But she relayed that the younger Muñoz had ordered temperature-sensitive paint meant for warmer temperatures early to allow time for testing and wanted to use the paint it had in its stockpile on another roadway.
Eight days later, though, Jayson Grover, the district's traffic engineer, raised a red flag with the plan: Prestigious Paving was "NOT the lowest bidder" for "low temp paint," he wrote in an email to Vega, Landon Muñoz and others Nov. 13, 2024.
Candelaria also filed referral letters of "possible public corruption" with the New Mexico Department of Justice and the U.S. Attorney's Office in New Mexico. He said his claims "should be pretty easily fact-checked" with telephone records and call logs.
"So, we'll see who's telling the truth," he said. "But to me, the explanation sounds [like] another high-powered politician lying through his teeth because he's been caught abusing his office to profit himself and his family on a level that we have not yet seen in New Mexico."
In a statement to The New Mexican, the Transportation Department wrote it has not seen the ethics complaint and is unaware of the specific details or supporting documentation submitted to the Ethics Commission.
"Given the limited information available at this time, NMDOT cannot confirm the phone call or the sequence of actions described in the complaint," the department wrote. "As a general matter, NMDOT follows established procurement procedures and takes compliance with the Governmental Conduct Act seriously."
It alleges three violations of the Governmental Conduct Act against Sen. George Muñoz and one violation of the Financial Disclosure Act for an "unfiled or untimely" 2025 financial disclosure report, which Muñoz contends exists on the New Mexico Secretary of State's campaign finance reporting system.
Candelaria emailed every member of the state Legislature on Friday afternoon to share the public records he obtained concerning the Transportation Department's contracting with Prestigious Paving between 2022 and 2026. He wrote they "raise questions about agency procurement practice that are properly the Legislature's to consider, and because I do not think a selective distribution would be fair to anyone."
While George Muñoz was among the recipients, he said Tuesday he was unaware of Candelaria's ethics complaint, which notes the Governmental Conduct Act prohibits a legislator from assisting another person before a state agency "unless that appearance, representation or assistance is provided without compensation."
Candelaria argues George Muñoz's household receives income from the company, noting he reported in his financial disclosure that his wife earned more than $5,000 in gross income from the company in 2023 and 2025. He also noted in the complaint George Muñoz's construction company and his son's business shared a telephone number and post office box.
Landon Muñoz wrote in a statement Prestigious Paving received a purchase order in August for roadway striping work in Southern New Mexico. The roadway was supposed to be ready for striping in September, prompting the company to order what he called high-build traffic paint "suited for application at approximately 55 degrees Fahrenheit and rising."
"Switching to a low-temperature paint formulation was necessary to complete the work safely under those conditions. Leaving the roadway without required pavement markings would have posed a significant and unnecessary safety risk to the traveling public," he said.
"In passing, I mentioned the situation to my father," he said. "I regret that this created an appearance of involvement beyond what was appropriate, and I take full responsibility for having raised it with him in the first place."
Follow Daniel J. Chacón on Twitter @danieljchacon.
#### Takeaways
- An ethics complaint filed against state Sen. George Muñoz and three employees of the New Mexico Department of Transportation alleges violations of the Governmental Conduct Act and Procurement Code. - The complaint is based on a call memorialized in an email in which Muñoz reportedly lobbied the Transportation Department on behalf of his son, who owns a fast-growing pavement marking company that contracts with the agency. - Muñoz, chair of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, said he doesn't remember making such a call.
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