First term
Johnson entered politics for the first time in 1994, with the intention of running for governor and was advised by "Republican Elders"[16] to run for the State Legislature instead.[16] In spite of their advice, Johnson spent $500,000 of his own money and entered the race with the intent of bringing a "common sense business approach" to the office.[23] Johnson's campaign slogan was "People before Politics".[24] His platform emphasized tax cuts, job creation, state government spending growth restraint, and law and order.[5]
He won the Republican nomination, defeating state legislator Richard P. Cheney by 34% to 33%, with John Dendahl and former governor David F. Cargo in third and fourth. Johnson also won the general election, defeating the incumbent Democratic Governor Bruce King by 50% to 40%. Johnson was elected in a nationally Republican year, although party registration in the state of New Mexico at the time was 2-to-1 Democratic.
As governor, Johnson followed a strict small government approach. According to former New Mexico Republican National Committee member Mickey D. Barnett, "Any time someone approached him about legislation for some purpose, his first response always was to ask if government should be involved in that to begin with."[25] He vetoed 200 of 424 bills in his first six months in office – a national record of 48% of all legislation – and used the line-item veto on most remaining bills.[4]
In office, Johnson fulfilled his campaign promise to reduce the 10% annual growth of the state budget.[citation needed] In his first budget, Johnson proposed a wide range of tax cuts, including a repeal of the prescription drug tax, a $47 million income tax cut, and a 6 cents per gallon gasoline tax cut. However, of these, only the gasoline tax cut was passed.[26] During the November 1995 federal government shutdown, he joined 20 other Republican governors who called on the Republican leadership in Congress to stand firm in negotiations against the Clinton administration in budget negotiations; in the article reporting on the letter and concomitant news conference he was quoted as calling for eliminating the budget deficit through proportional cuts across the budget.[27]
Although Johnson worked to reduce overall state spending, in his first term, Johnson raised education spending by nearly a third. [11] When drop-out rates and test scores showed little improvement, Johnson changed his tactics and began advocating for school vouchers – a key issue in budget battles of his second term. [11]
Like other southwestern states, New Mexico must deal with a scarcity of fresh water and threats of drought,[citation needed] and these issues were acute in the late 1990s. In 1998, Johnson established a state drought task force; the result was a coordinated effort among state and federal officials to anticipate drought conditions and disseminate information ahead of an actual shortage.[28]
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Second term
In 1998, Johnson ran for re-election as governor against Democratic Albuquerque Mayor Martin Chavez. In his campaign, he promised to continue the policies of his first term: improving schools; cutting state spending, taxes, and bureaucracy; and frequent use of his veto power.[29] Fielding a strong Hispanic candidate in a 40% Hispanic state, the Democrats were expected to oust Johnson,[11] but Johnson won by a 55% to 45% margin:[30] making him the first Governor of New Mexico to serve two four-year terms after term limits were expanded to two terms in 1991.[23]
Johnson made the promotion of a school voucher system a "hallmark issue" of his second term.[31] In 1999, he proposed the first state-wide voucher system in America, which would have enrolled 100,000 students in its first year.[11] That year, he vetoed two budgets that failed to include a voucher program and a government shutdown was threatened,[11] but ultimately yielded to Democrat majorities in both houses of the New Mexico Legislature, who opposed the plan. Johnson signed the budget, but line-item vetoed a further $21m, or 0.5%, from the legislative plan.[32]
In 1999, Johnson became one of the highest-ranking elected officials in the United States to advocate the legalization of marijuana.[33] Saying the War on Drugs was "an expensive bust," he advocated the decriminalization of marijuana use and concentration on harm reduction measures for all other illegal drugs. "He compared attempts to enforce the nation's drug laws with the failed attempt at alcohol prohibition. Half of what government spends on police, courts and prisons is to deal with drug offenders."[20] He suggests that drug abuse be treated as a health issue, not as a criminal issue. His approach to the issue garnered supportive notice from conservative icon William F. Buckley,[34] as well as the Cato Institute and Rolling Stone.[16]
In 2000, Johnson proposed a more ambitious voucher program than he had proposed the year before, under which each parent would receive $3,500 per child for education at any private or parochial school.[31] The Democrats sought $90m extra school funding without school vouchers, and questioned Johnson's request for more funding for state-run prisons, having opposed his opening of two private prisons.[35] Negotiations between the governor and the legislature were contentious, again nearly leading to shut down the government.
In 2000, New Mexico was devastated by the Cerro Grande Fire. Johnson's handling of the disaster earned him accolades from the The Denver Post, which observed that he:
was all over the Cerro Grande Fire last week. He helped reporters understand where the fire was headed when low-level Forest Service officials couldn't, ran herd over the bureaucratic process of getting state and federal agencies and the National Guard involved, and even helped put out some of the fire with his feet. On a tour of Los Alamos last Wednesday, when he saw small flames spreading across a lawn, he had his driver stop his car. He jumped out and stomped on the flames, as did his wife and some of his staffers.[12]
Johnson's leadership during the fire was praised by Democratic Congressman Tom Udall, who said: "I think the real test of leadership is when you have circumstances like this. He's called on his reserves of energy and has just been a really excellent leader under very difficult circumstances here."[12]
He rebuffed efforts by the Libertarian Party to draft him in the 2000 presidential election.[36]
Legacy
In an interview in Reason Magazine in January 2001, Johnson's accomplishments in office were described as follows: "no tax increases in six years, a major road building program, shifting Medicaid to managed care, constructing two new private prisons, canning 1,200 state employees, and vetoing a record number of bills."[23]
Andrew Sullivan quoted a claim that Johnson "is highly regarded in the state for his outstanding leadership during two terms as governor. He slashed the size of state government during his term and left the state with a large budget surplus."[37] According to one New Mexico paper, "Johnson left the state fiscally solid," and was "arguably the most popular governor of the decade . . . leaving the state with a $1 billion budget surplus."[38] The Washington Times has reported that when Johnson left office, "the size of state government had been substantially reduced and New Mexico was enjoying a large budget surplus."[25]
According to a profile of Johnson in the National Review, "During his tenure, he vetoed more bills than the other 49 governors combined — 750 in total, one third of which had been introduced by Republican legislators. Johnson also used his line-item-veto power thousands of times. He credits his heavy veto pen for eliminating New Mexico's budget deficit and cutting the growth rate of New Mexico's government in half."[39] Johnson has "said his numerous vetoes, only two of which were overridden, stemmed from his philosophy of looking at all things for their cost-benefit ratio and his axe fell on Republicans as well as Democrats."[20]
