Apr. 14—SANTA FE — After coming up short in her bid to unseat U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich last year, Nella Domenici is not planning to run again in 2026.
The Republican, who is the daughter of the late, former longtime New Mexico Sen. Pete Domenici, said Monday she has ruled out a campaign for governor or any other statewide office next year.
“While I am honored, I have determined that the best way to help the state that I love is to dedicate my efforts outside of government,” Domenici said in a statement.
Despite raising roughly $4 million and giving an additional $3 million in personal loans to her campaign, Domenici lost to Heirnich in last November’s general election by roughly 10 percentage points.
During the campaign, Domenici tried to portray Heinrich as a “radical” Democrat but faced a steady stream of attacks and questions about her stance on abortion.
She also declined to say up until about a month before Election Day whether she planned to back fellow Republican Donald Trump’s bid to return to the White House.
While Domenici ultimately expressed support for Trump and then spoke at his Oct. 31 campaign rally in Albuquerque, she ended up receiving roughly 17,400 fewer votes than Trump got in New Mexico. But her vote total was the second-highest received by a GOP candidate in a statewide race in New Mexico, trailing only the amount of votes cast for Mark Ronchetti in his unsuccessful 2020 bid for the U.S. Senate.
In a Monday interview, Domenici said she planned to stay in New Mexico and continue working on health care, education, public safety and economic development issues from the private sector, where she believes she can make more of an impact.
But she said many people had urged her to run again for elected office since Election Day last year.
“We were really running against a deep-rooted incumbent who was well funded,” she said of her race against Heinrich.
Before running for the U.S. Senate seat, Domenici was chief financial officer for one of the world’s largest hedge funds, Bridgewater Associates. She also worked for several other firms, including the artificial intelligence firm Dataminr.
Domenici has also been active in philanthropic efforts, as she and her husband helped found and fund a nonprofit group, Excellent Schools New Mexico, that supports charter schools.
Meanwhile, Domenici’s decision not to run again next year means no Republican candidates have of yet officially announced campaigns for governor or U.S. Senate in 2026.
Two Democrats, Deb Haaland and Sam Bregman, have already announced bids for governor, while U.S. Sen. Ben Ray Luján, D-N.M., will seek reelection next year to a new six-year term, a spokesman confirmed.
No GOP candidate has won a statewide race in New Mexico since former Supreme Court Justice Judith Nakamura did so in 2016. The last Republican elected to the U.S. Senate from New Mexico was Pete Domenici, who stepped down in 2009 after a 36-year tenure on Capitol Hill. He died in 2017 at age 85.