Mar. 11—A Republican representative running for reelection is under fire for planning a firearm auction to raise money for her campaign as the state grapples with one of the nation’s highest rates of gun violence.

Rep. Stefani Lord, a staunch Second Amendment advocate, will be auctioning off a handgun and a rifle at a campaign event next week at Ribs BBQ in Cedar Crest.

“When I’ve run [for public office], I’ve always had a gun auction,” Lord, R-Sandia Park, said in an interview Monday.

“It brings a tremendous amount of money, and the people like it,” she said. “I haven’t had any complaints in the East Mountains, so I will continue doing that every year until I hear otherwise.”

The Democratic Party of New Mexico decried Lord’s auction.

“Stefani Lord’s latest stunt is insulting to anyone who has been a victim of or lost a loved one to gun violence,” spokesman Daniel Garcia wrote in a statement. “But we don’t expect anything less from the least serious representative in the Legislature.”

Garcia noted Lord “even voted against” a safe gun storage bill last year. House Bill 9, known as the Bennie Hargrove Gun Safety Act and named for a slain Albuquerque middle school student, was designed to ensure adults keep their guns out of the hands of children. It was signed into law.

“If Lord actually cared about public safety and saving lives by preventing gun violence, we would see her support any commonsense gun reforms. But instead, we get another wacky attention grab from the radical,” Garcia wrote.

New Mexicans to Prevent Gun Violence also denounced Lord’s auction.

“It’s discouraging when our elected officials care more about their personal agendas than the safety of their constituents,” Miranda Viscoli, co-president of the organization, wrote in a statement.

“Parts of her district experience some of the worst gun violence in New Mexico,” Viscoli added. “Her political stunt to auction firearms to raise money for a candidate is morally repugnant.”

Lord, founder of Pro-Gun Women, shot back, saying she — unlike Viscoli — is doing everything by the book.

“Miranda is morally repugnant because she went to Farmington and allegedly got firearms without doing a background check and without checking to see if those firearms are stolen,” Lord said, referring to a gun buyback event late last year that remains under investigation by the San Juan County Sheriff’s Office.

Sheriff Shane Ferrari is investigating whether Viscoli’s organization violated a state law requiring background checks for buyers in firearms transactions when the group proceeded with a buyback event — collecting unwanted guns from residents to dismantle them — without the presence of law enforcement.

“New Mexicans [to Prevent] Gun Violence is not going to be charged with anything,” Ferrari said in an interview. “What they are being is educated on the correct way to run their gun buyback programs.”

Lord said she doesn’t need a federal firearms license for the auction because she’s not buying a gun. A campaign flyer shows the weapons are being supplied by BMC Tactical and Right to Bear Arms in Albuquerque.

“The people from the gun store will bring the firearm. They’ll show it. People will bid on it, and then from there they have to go to the [federal firearms license holder] and the FFL will do the background check on the person buying the gun,” she said. “I would never give a firearm to somebody without doing a background check.”

Lord said she’s not concerned about the optics of auctioning firearms in a state struggling with gun violence.

New Mexico ranked third among states for its rate of gun deaths in 2021, the latest nationwide data available, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“I am not concerned because the people that come to my events, the people that support me, are all lawful gun owners, and 99.99985% of people who own what they like to call a gas-operated firearm do absolutely nothing illegal with it,” Lord said. “Most of the people that have firearms are legal firearm owners, so no, absolutely not worried at all.”

She didn’t know the type of firearms that will be auctioned at the fundraiser.

“I haven’t pinned down exactly what I’m getting, but it will be a handgun and a rifle,” she said.

Lord said the room where she’s holding the event accommodates only about 85 people.

“There’s probably room for maybe 10 more people,” she said, adding the interest in her event tells her the people of House District 22 support her “and their Second Amendment rights.”

Follow Daniel J. Chacón on Twitter @danieljchacon.