Jodi Hendricks – New Mexico Family Action Movement
December 15, 2025
Tim Keller has won another term as mayor of Albuquerque, the first to be elected to a third term in our city’s history. Congratulations, Albuquerque. We will continue to experience unprecedented rates of homelessness, crime, and chaos.
But before anyone rushes to either celebrate or despair, we need to confront a harder truth. This election was not decided by a groundswell of confidence in the direction of our city. It was decided by apathy.
Only about 35 percent of eligible voters bothered to show up in this runoff election. In a city struggling with public safety, open drug use, failing infrastructure, and a visible humanitarian crisis on our streets, nearly two thirds of voters stayed home. That is not a mandate for Keller, it is indifference.
The biggest victims of the state of our city will not be those who live in gated communities or insulated neighborhoods. It will be the small business owners trying to survive downtown while theft, vandalism, and foot traffic decline. It will be the families raising children in neighborhoods overrun with drug addiction and encampments, where walking to a park no longer feels safe. And it will be the city as a whole, as businesses choose not to expand here or leave altogether, taking good paying jobs with them because no one wants to invest in a place where disorder feels permanent.
This outcome happened because too many people decided that voting was pointless, or that national political grudges mattered more than local leadership. For many, the calculation was simply: “Never vote Republican.” For others, it was about sending a message to Donald Trump, even though he was not on the ballot and has nothing to do with the day to day governance of our city.
Local elections are not symbolic protests, they are decisions with real life consequences. When voters sit out they should also sit out from complaining or criticizing the state of the city. After all, they did nothing when they had a chance to make a difference.
Apathy always favors the status quo. It favors incumbents. It favors systems already in place, even when those systems are failing. And it sends a clear message to city leadership that there is little political cost to continued dysfunction.
If Albuquerque is going to change, it will not come from slogans or social media outrage. It will come when voters decide that their city is worth showing up for. It will come when we demand accountability, not perfection, and are willing to vote for a different direction even when it feels uncomfortable or unpopular.
How much worse does it have to get before the voters of Albuquerque decide they want a change? I’m not sure we want to find out.
What we do know is this: a city cannot be rescued by the 35 percent. Until more of us are willing to engage, to vote, and to take responsibility for the future of our community, we will keep getting exactly what we are willing to tolerate.
