Steve Pearce: “I represent the southern district of New Mexico, New Mexico 2. I come with a chart today, and with a map of the…”

“I represent the southern district of New Mexico, New Mexico 2. I come with a chart today, and with a map of the district. Now, if you can visualize, I live all the way on the east side of the State, Hobbs, New Mexico. We are about 3 miles from the Texas border and represent all of the way to Arizona. Now, it is almost a 9- to 9½-hour drive to come across to the Silver City area, and then if we have to go further north up into the Zuni area, it takes an additional 2 to 3 hours. So each time I go home is a lot of miles. On a 3-day weekend, we have made up to 1,000 miles. On the 10-day breaks, we have been known to make up to 2,500 miles with events all of the way across. And then on our first 30-day break, our August break in my first year here, we had 29 different motel rooms and about 6,500 miles that we made to cover this large district. Now, my particular approach today is to talk about a rule that the new majority put into place when we voted on January 4, 2007.”