it said we had one of the most burdensome tax codes in the country. i've long said government doesn't create jobs. it doesn't. small businesses do. but government can and does create the environment to help small businesses grow. we can do so much more to level the playing field for our small businesses. to put more new mexicans back to work. that's why i am proposing that we exempt roughly half of new mexico's small businesses, those earning less than $50,000 per year from the gross receipts tax. that's roughly 40,000 of our small businesses. the little ones. the starup s

the starutart-ups. this is a bottom line approach. many successful businesses started at kitchen tables with not much more than a savings account from the family and a dream. we freed to invest in a culture of entrepreneurship so more of these family businesses can make it. so they can grow and hire more are new mexicans. i'm also proposing a tax credit for high-tech research and development to attract more high-paying jobs to the state. and this year it's time for us to stop the double and triple taxation that is crippling our construction and manufacturing industries. this is often called pyramiding. a business-to-business tax that kills jobs in new mexico, because of our tax system, it's cheaper for mu mexico companies

to hire an out of state corporation for services rather than to hire an in-state firm. it makes no sense. om two other states in the entire country impose taxes like this. and it's time for us to end it. and for the ultimate heroes among us, i am proposing a $1,000 tax credit for employer whose hire veterans returning home from deployment. these men and women should not fight for our freedoms abroad only to be stuck on the unemployment line when they return home. we are joined today by major

john miller as well as -- who is a pilot in our air national guard. 23 years. most recently deployed to iraq and staff sergeant anna du of the national guard who sent all of 2011 deployed as leader in the nato-led peacekeeping mission in kosovo. please stand. >> we thank you for your service. it is because of your fight it allows to us have differences of opinion and freedom of speech. we are so grateful for what our

veterans have done and continue to do for us, but both major miller and staff sergeant du are making a career in the military to eventually retire. these veterans and so many others who i see here today have given us freedom, and i am proposing that we allow retiring veterans to exempt 25% of their pension income from state taxes. ladies and gentlemen, we must agree, they have earned it. another critical element to turning new mexico around a rooting out corruption. we're making progress, but there is much more we can do. corruption tilts's playing field

against honest people and shakes public confidence in their government. that's why i signed an executive order that prohibits state government from doing business with companies involved in corruption. it's why all of my appointees must disclose their financial interests online, and it's why my appointees are barred from lobbying state government for two years after serving in my administration. public service should be about serving the public. not setting up a future are pay date. that's why i'm once again asking you to close the revolving door that turns citizen legislators into special interest lobbyists. where one day they're serving the public, and the next day they're using those connections to serve special interests.

both parties are guilty of this. it's wrong for democrats and it's wrong for republicans. there are a few other common sense measures we can enabilict. when a public official is convicted of corruption they should be forced to remove themselves from their position, immediately. not ten days or 14 days later. when a politician violates the public trust, they should lose their public pension and be barred from doing business with the state of new mexico. and when the state goes after a public official for corruption to get taxpayers their money back, taxpayers should not have

to defend that person in court and pay for those legal fees. new mexicans expect us to act, to pass these reforms and to state loud and clear corruption in new mexico will not stand. finally, keeping new mexico children and families safe should be a top priority every time our legislature meets. just look around at the little ones that are here in the audience today. like you, i was horrified over the holidays to read about the tragic and inexcusable cases of child abuse. a child just a few weeks old badly beaten, sexually abused and eventually left to die.

small, helpless little girls bruised and broken and left in the bathtub. i have spent my life and career helping those who had no voice. particularly children who had been the victim of senseless cruelty, violence and abuse. i'm asking you to join me in standing up for those who are unable to stand for themselves. i am asking you to increase penalties for child abuse. those who abuse children should face severe mandatory penalties.

>> we must also put justice for victims first during every legislative session. senator bill payne and i had the opportunity to meet with a family of michael snyder, an albuquerque man who was murdered by his wife, and then secretly buried him at his home for eight years. michael's sisters terriy and laura as well as michael's mother alleen are here today. please, stand. michael's wife said, he had simply gone missing. simply had left, and sadly, her secret was kept long enough that the statute of limitations had run out. so this killer are will serve only a few years for a murder that should have kept her behind

bars the rest of her life. that is not right, and we are going to change the law and fight to ensure that no one is able to murder someone in our state and get off easy. or get away with it completely by simply letting out the -- letting the clock run out. that is wrong. i am confident that we can work together to solve our pressing public safety needs. the democrats, republicans and andy. we can do it. strengthening megan's law to ensure sex offenders can not live in secret in our neighborhoods, allowing amber alerts to be issued when relatives abduct a child and put them in harm's way, and, yes, ending the practice of providing

driver's licenses to illegal immigrants as well. just last week a man pled guilty in alamogordo to trafficking humans from pakistan and elsewhere through new york, and into our state. a touch-and-go, to grab our license, to grab our government issued i.d. card and leave. to where? who knows. for what purpose? who knows. over and over are the same story. the fraud, the trafficking, the security threats. i want to thank independent representative andy nunez forri

this law. thank you, sir. and i want to thank the democratic house judiciary committee chairman al park for working with us last session to cut through and tone down the rhetoric, and to develop a compromise. a bill that does not give driver's licenses to illegal immigrants but does allow foreign nationals who are here legally on a work or student visa to get that driver's license. that was good compromise, and it cleared the house last year with bipartisan support. this issue has been debated thoroughly. the desire of new mexicans is clear, and it's time to vote to

repeal the law. i'm also asking the legislature to work with me to crack down on repeat drunk drivers pap vehicle in the hands of a reap drunk drive sir a deadly weapon. it's a deadly weapon that we should confiscate. just like they do in the city of albuquerque. we should seize the vehicles of repeat drunk drivers and for those who rack up four, five and six or more dwis who just don't get the message, it's time to impose more serious mandatory prison sentences that get them off the streets and away from our families. controversial issues like these

always stir heated debate, and that's okay, because we have proven that through tough debate we can find common ground. without compromising our principles. on all sorts of issues. we did it last year to protect classroom spending. we did it on school grading. we did it on katie's law and to close the loop thiholeloopholes. we did it together. we should all be proud of these successes, but not for us. but because of what it means to others. i'm reminded of a quote that hangs on my wall today. it motivates me to work for all of the things we've discussed. it reads -- "100 years from now it will not matter what my bank account was. the sort of house i lived in, or the kind of car i drove. but the world may be different

because i was important in the life of a child." new mexico turned 100 this year. think of where we've been as a state. how far we've come, and 100 years from now, imagine our, what our state will be, and accept the responsibility that we all share, to shape that future, to provide an even greater state for the children and grandchildren of new mexico. i believe there is good reason to be optimistic. new mexicans always rise to the challenge. i would be remiss not to recall how families, friends and neighbors took care of one another as many battled record-cold temperatures without heat last winter. and the record-breaking wildfires we faced over the summer. i was humbled and honored to

watch new mexico's finest battling these blazes with poise, grace, guts and determination. i'd like to have former los alamos fire chief doug tucker and police chief wayne torpy to, please, stand. >> we became pretty close friends throughout the fire pap community trusted you. they relied on your briefings and on the men and women you trained to handle a crisis of that magnitude. gentlemen, you made new mexico proud. thank you.

today i believe that in front of us is an opportunity to make tomorrow better than today. to create a new mexico that reflects our values. a place where those who play by the rules succeed and those who don't are brought to justice. a place where those who have risked their lives to protect our freedom return home to find a state that has protected their jobs. a place where small businesses grow, and where other companies choose to locate. a place where every new mexico child is taught to chase his or her dreams that when they struggle, they're helped. where they learn to overcome challenges, but never, ever accept failure. it is up to us to seize this

moment, to face our challenges and rise once again to the occasion. new mexico's best days are ahead of us. i believe that. i know you believe that. and together we will ensure our children live that. thank you all. god bless you. god bless new mexico and all our work ahead of us. today on c-span3, watch a discussion on election issues. topics include voter outreach campaigns, and state voter participation efforts. that's hosted by the national association of secretaries of state, live at 1:30 p.m. eastern.

with the florida primaries just a day away, republican presidential candidates are on the campaign trail today making their final pitches to the state's voters. this afternoon, c-span will bring you live road to the white house coverage of several campaign rallies starting at about 2:00 p.m. eastern, it's newt gingrich speaking to supporters in tampa, which is the site of 9 republican national convention in august. and at 6:10 today we'll go live to mitt romney's final campaign event in the state. he'll be at a rally at the villages retirement community. again, live coverage of both of these events today on c-span. for more resources in the presidential race, use c-span's campaign 2012 website positive watch video of the candidates' events in florida, see what they've said on issues important to you and read the latest from the candidates, political reporters and people like you from social media sites. at cspan.org/campaign2012. this morning on "washington

journal," joining to us talk about immigration and voter i.d. laws. voter id laws. this is about 40 minutes. >> we're joined bough know janet marguia, president and ceo of la raza to continue our discussion about florida and hispanic issues in florida. the national cancel is the largest civil rights advocacy organization in the united states. thanks for joining us. want to get your thought -- it's been a whirlwind two weeks in florida. talk about your sense of how the immigration issue has come out in the florida primary. we've had a lot of discussion this morning on the "washington journal." >> sure. i think it's been fascinating really, to see the candidates for the first time talk about the issue with the knowledge that part of the electorate in the state in which they're running is really a diverse

state with a large and significant and important block of latino voters and hispanic voters. so for us it's been very revealing to see how many of these candidates, including romney and gingrich, are initiating their outreach for the first time in ernest to latino voters. i think what we've seen is it is knew. i don't think we've heard candidate romney really talk like he has spoken in the last few weeks about immigration. in fact, immigration was something that he spoke very little about in iowa and south carolina and in new hampshire, and today we find that he is moderating. it seems to be that he's moderating his tone on immigration and obviously because of the important of that constituency there, i think is trying to do more to articulate

a message of embracing immigrants and the need to address this issue. but other candidates, i think, gingrich have tried to talk about this issue before. i don't think he's gotten much traction. but i think now, i think we're seeing that he also is in a more clear way trying to articulate his position. just the fact that they're engaging on this issue in a bigger way, i think, is significant. and i think it's attributable to the fact that you've got a very important hispanic voting bloc in that state. >> we're going to do the phone lines a little bit different on this segment of the washington journal. on the democratic line is 202-737-0001. republicans, 202-737-0002. independents, 202-728-6205. also on the line hispanic voters. give us a call on 202-628-0184. we were talking about the candidates and their out reach to the hispanic voters.

want to go to a mason dixon poll that was in the field january 24th, mitt romney up -- just hispanic voters. mitt romney up 52%. newt gingrich at 28%. rick santorum at 7%. ron paul at 3% with 10% undecided. i want to talk a little bit about issue set that specifically important to hispanic voters in florida. pugh polling shows on hispanic countries of origin that eligible voters in florida, about one-third of hispanic voters from florida are of cuban origin. 28% r. are from pouerto rican origin. contrast that nationwide among hispanic eligible voters, 59% of mexican. 14% are pouerto rican. 5% are cuban. how is this influencing the debate or some of the issues that the candidates are talking about in florida? >> well, i think in quite a few

ways. i think it's important as you know to say that the hispanic population is not a monolithic group. it is diverse in and of itself. you have different breakouts of hispanic subgroups and in florida they happen to be almost inverted in terms of their percentage of the represented hispanic population nationally. i do think that what's happening is that candidates are trying to find ways to connect with this important growing voting bloc and it has grown significantly not just nationally but in florida. and, in fact, in 2008 the hispanic voting bloc was decisive in launching senator mccain's presidential campaign and really securing his nomination for the republican party. i think what's happening though is that because of the mix of percentages of the subpopulations and hispanic population, it is confusing for some of the candidates to figure

out how they want to engage folks. they know cubans, cuban-americans care are predominantly in the past have been largely aligned with the republican party. but the mix of puerto ricans in the state as well as other central americans and south americans and mexicans is creating, i think, some confusion. i think we're see that played out in how they engage on immigrati immigration. it feels like they're struggling to really articulate a clear position on immigration. but what we're finding in florida is that the hispanic population cares not just about immigration, it's not the most important issue, although it is a stlesh hothreshold issue for . but the economy. i think the economy has hit florida hard and in particular the foreclosure crisis in hispanics were hit very hard by the foreclosure crisis nationally. but in florida we're seeing that is one of the biggest states that was effected by the crash in the market and in the

reaction that we've seen or the impact we've seen in the hispanic community. so there are several issues of importance to the hispanic community but obviously immigration is surfacing as one of the key ones. >> this article from news day from january 27th talks about some of the other issues the candidates bring up on the trail. headline is "romney, gingrich, focus on hispanic voters in florida." gingrich called for a u.s.-supported cuban spring uprising against a long-standing communist regime in that country. if elected gingrich said he would bring to brear the moral force of people at tenting to free the people of cuba and say to them, you will be held accountable. he would support a port corick can referendum on whether it should be granted statehood. >> again, among some of the different hispanic subpopulations that we're seeing, some issues resonate more than others with the

cuban-american population, issues relating to cuba, trade issues and other issues, often resonate much higher than they do with mexican-american population here or the puerto rico population. and so statehood matterses tremendously or how different puerto ricans view the status of puerto rico in the future. is it important issue. whether statehood or common wealth or independent. you find different views even within the puerto rican community. so there are many issues that are important to the hispanic community. some more important to these populations. >> let's listen to an issue that a lot of groups have been upset about since newt gingrich talked about it on friday. this is a clip of him talking about english being the official language of the united states. >> i am for english as the official language of government. and the fact is english is the language of maximum opportunity. every parent who comes here

knows this. they all want their children to grow up and have the maximum chance to rise. this should not be controversial. i met with t. other day with the president of miami-dade and they currently have 94 languages in their college. 200 languages in cooke county, chicago. so clearly we want everybody to be able to talk with each other. unless people start to relax and say, okay, we're inviting people to come to america and become americans. >> did the council of la raza have a reaction to that? >> we also view english as an important language for everyone to embrace because it is important and -- for us to see our community become successful here in the united states. so, in fact, at ncor, our affiliating, we have classes, english classes that are filled

almost 24 hours a day with different individuals wanting to learn english. in fact, we can't get enough funding to support english classes. everyone agrees that learning english is important. in miami-dade college, 94 languages are spoken. the issue should be, of course, it's important to learn english and, as immigrants, particularly in the hispanic community, we've seen a trend within our demographics, we even beyond the first generation. it doesn't take long for that first generation to really embrace english. that's not really the issue. the issue is we are in an increasing he global economy. we should be embracing several languages if we're going to be cop pettive in this country. it's important to not just understand that -- it's important for everyone to learn english but it's important for everyone to understand that we must learn several languagesf