SANTA FE, N.M. — A growing scandal within the New Mexico Survivor Truth Commission has prompted outrage from House Republicans and fueled further calls for the resignation of Chair Rep. Andrea Romero amidst mounting corruption allegations. Newly released invoices reveal that a taxpayer-funded public relations firm hired by the Commission conducted political opposition research on state legislators less than three months ahead of a critical election.
House Republican Leader Gail Armstrong (R-Magdalena) expressed severe condemnation after reviewing billing records from Dini von Mueffling Consulting (DVMC), the firm retained under Chair Romero. The invoices, which total $8,625.00 for 115 hours of consulting work in August 2026, were uncovered after Rep. Andrea Reeb (R-Clovis), a member of the Commission, requested the records from the Legislative Council Service.
“When Representative Reeb showed me these invoices, I was appalled,” Leader Armstrong said in a press release issued Wednesday. “Chair Romero had a taxpayer-funded PR firm running political opposition research on members of the Legislature, digging into our backgrounds and our associates, just before an important election. And she did it behind the backs of at least half her own Commission.”
The controversy centers on several billing entries from DVMC that appear disconnected from the Truth Commission’s stated purpose of finding the truth for the victims and survivors of Jeffrey Epstein. A detailed time log entry for August 24 explicitly bills taxpayers for an “internal call on other NM state legislature members, political backgrounds, prior work before coming to the Commission and legislature, known associates and history”. Other entries throughout August charged the state for research into Commission members’ “party affiliations,” “public sentiment towards R/D,” “NM party politics,” and “partisan deals”.
According to the House Republican Caucus, the two Republican members of the four-member Truth Commission—Rep. Reeb and Rep. Bill Hall—were never informed that this research was being conducted, nor was any of the resulting information shared with them.
The explosive revelations are amplifying calls for Rep. Romero to step down, following a string of recent controversies. Leader Armstrong explicitly highlighted these compounding issues, pointing to Romero’s “illegal employment” and the “misuse of the Commission’s PR firm for her personal statements” as evidence of severe mismanagement.
“Between her illegal employment, the misuse of the Commission’s PR firm for her personal statements, and now political opposition research on the taxpayers’ dime, her mismanagement has done serious damage to this Commission’s integrity,” Armstrong stated.
In response to the invoices, Leader Armstrong is publicly demanding that Chair Romero explain every entry billed by DVMC and immediately release all work products produced by the firm. Furthermore, Armstrong is demanding Romero explain who authorized this research without the full Commission’s knowledge, and answer whether the directives came from House Democratic leadership or were her own doing.
“Chair Romero owes the public, the survivors and her fellow Commission members straight answers,” Armstrong said. “This Commission was created to find the truth for the survivors and victims Jeffrey Epstein left in his wake, not to build political files on her colleagues.”
