By Sherry Robinson
All She Wrote
© 2026 New Mexico News Services

Two days after CYFD assured the public that it was successfully addressing its high caseloads and recruiting new foster families, a story broke that the state agency charged with protecting children walked a teenager to the Mexican border and ordered him to rejoin his mother in Juarez. The mother he hadn’t lived with in nine years. The mother deported by Texas on drug charges. The mother CYFD first said was abusive but then reversed itself to force reunification. The mother CYFD claimed to have vetted by phone.

CYFD sent the teen, a U.S. citizen with a heart condition, across the bridge at night to meet his mother. He bolted and ran across three lanes of traffic toward El Paso, where he spent 10 days in a homeless shelter before Texas and Mexican authorities took him to Juárez.

We see again and again that the state Children Youth and Families Department doesn’t just have staffing and program issues, its decision makers come up short on common sense and common decency. However, the newly created Office of the Child Advocate alerted the state’s Attorney General, who has sued to get the boy returned to New Mexico. The governor’s spokesman defended CYFD and attacked the AG.

My dad used to talk to us about “right and wrong.” To him it was that simple—no shades of grey. This incident violates most people’s sense of right and wrong. Both candidates for governor get that, even if the governor doesn’t.

Republican Gregg Hull told the Albuquerque Journal: “If my administration allowed this to happen, and I didn’t know about it, I’d step out and own it. The buck stops with the Governor’s Office.” He added, “I can think of one policy that needs to be implemented immediately: Never turn over a 15-year-old at the international border unescorted.”

Hull, a three-term mayor of Rio Rancho, said it was necessary to understand who made the decisions and why. “If the Governor’s Office and the Attorney General’s Office were informed about this, why did they ultimately let this go forward?” On his website, Hull calls for clear standards, accountability, caseload limits for caseworkers, modern data systems, and safety first in placements.

Democrat Deb Haaland, a former Interior Secretary and congresswoman, said in a news release: “The decision to send a child across the border alone is unacceptable. My heart breaks every time a child is harmed because of poor policy. Kids need to be kept safe and right now CYFD fails to meet that responsibility.”

For some time, Haaland has promised an “overhaul” of CYFD. She’s said she would appoint a qualified secretary and direct them to increase staff, rebuild partnerships and standardize foster recruitment and certification. That’s fine, but she also proposes restructuring CYFD. Instead of being a state agency with a cabinet secretary who answers to the governor, it would be under an independent commission.

Haaland and Hull both get points for stating clearly that what happened here is wrong, something the governor notably didn’t do, but Haaland’s desire to give CYFD more independence is misguided.

In April the state Department of Justice released a 216-page report after investigating CYFD for a year. The report described a department that operates in isolation and avoids accountability. It routinely resists or ignores requests from law enforcement, courts, the Legislature and the public. There is no transparency. Further separation would only make this worse.

Maralyn Beck, who leads the New Mexico Child First Network, is the state’s most credible watchdog. She has warned against removing CYFD from the governor’s control. In an April op-ed she wrote that serving children requires CYFD to work closely with other departments, and that requires having the same bureaucratic parents.

“(I)t’s worth mentioning that not one other state has removed its child welfare department from its governor’s office,” Beck wrote. “Not one. Nada. Zilch.” Beck said she understands how impatient and desperate we are for change. “But, as someone working in this space daily, I also know that the last thing this agency needs is more uncertainty and instability.

“Solutions exist—but please, this isn’t it. There is a fragile balance here, and lives are at stake. Do not be shortsighted on this. We don’t need to separate CYFD from the governor’s control. What we need is a governor who takes more control by taking to heart the chain reaction and interconnectedness of all child-serving agencies.”

Candidate Deb Haaland, are you listening?