Letters | Fifteen miles for water

Fifteen miles for water

There were some good articles printed in the June 26, 2025, Navajo Times newspaper about agriculture and range management issues.

I have a few head of cattle here in Gray Mountain, Arizona, Western Agency. My late mother gave me her grazing permit as a gift. My late father has his grazing permit but is a deceased permit. I would like to combine his grazing permit with my gifted permit. That way I would have a bigger spread (more cattle) on my permit.

Being the way weather is now with re-occurring drought, excessive heat, constant water hauling, and seven miles of rocky, dusty road is probably not a good idea long term. Luckily, I have not had any feral horses steal or drink up any of the cattle trough water yet. That would set me back another trip to the water station in Cameron, which will cost me more on fuel, 15 miles one way.

When I applied for drought relief assistance through Coconino County Agriculture last year, all I got was $20 deposited into my savings account. That won’t get me a decent shovel.

I have not heard from the Navajo Nation Drought Relief Program yet. I probably don’t qualify. Maybe I should run for Council as a delegate, but I probably won’t qualify because I don’t have the looks. I’ve heard if you want to go into politics, you have to look good.

I spent most of my younger days working on cattle ranches and ranch fencing. Some cowboys work on cattle and horses. One time my ranch foreman told me with this herd of cattle we will never get rich.

When we pray, we will pray for rain.

Larry Smith
Gray Mountain, Ariz.

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Not just a deal

In the high desert winds of New Mexico, where water is sacred and the land holds the stories of generations, a profound line has been drawn: Blackstone, the world’s largest private equity firm, wants to take over PNM, the state’s largest utility. But make no mistake – this is not just a financial transaction. It is an existential threat to Indigenous rights, climate integrity, and the sacred covenant between land and people.

The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) affirms the principle of Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) – a right, not a courtesy. It means Indigenous peoples have the right to say no to projects that affect their lands, waters, and cultures. Yet in New Mexico, this fundamental right is being trampled under the boots of private equity. There has been no meaningful consent from the Pueblos, Diné, or Apache Nations regarding this takeover. Blackstone’s ambition to acquire PNM comes with no consultation, no transparency, and no regard for those who have stewarded these lands for millennia.

Blackstone has never before privatized a major public utility. But its minority ownership in two others – FirstEnergy and NIPSCO – offers a glimpse of what’s to come. At FirstEnergy, Blackstone-backed management abandoned interim clean energy goals designed to address climate change. At NIPSCO in Indiana, a utility with 20 percent Blackstone ownership, emissions are set to rise by 30 percent due to new gas plants built not to serve the people, but to meet the ravenous energy demand of data centers. These data centers, which Blackstone is heavily investing in, are not just digital factories – they are environmental black holes. According to research, U.S. data centers alone consumed over 5 billion cubic meters of water and were responsible for nearly 0.5 percent of national GHG emissions in 2018. And this is only growing.

To allow Blackstone, a firm built on opaque deals and extractive models, to control New Mexico’s power grid is to give up our sovereignty – to fossil capitalism and data empire. Indigenous resistance to fossil fuel data expansion is not symbolic. It is a necessity. It is an obligation rooted in traditional ecological knowledge, in prayers to sacred rivers, in the ceremonial commitment to unborn generations.

Blackstone is the embodiment of what Indigenous water protectors have always fought: the monetization of life-giving systems. They don’t just invest in fossil fuel companies – they bankroll them. Blackstone has funneled billions into oil pipelines via Tallgrass on Navajo Nation, fracked gas, and LNG export terminals.

Their vision of the future is one where climate targets are traded for mega-profits, and water is rationed to communities while cooling towers for artificial intelligence and server farms run day and night.

In this moment, New Mexicans face a choice. Will we allow our future to be bought and sold? Will we let Wall Street write the next chapter of our energy story? Or will we stand with Indigenous nations and assert, loudly and clearly: there is no climate justice without Indigenous justice.

No new fossil monopoly dominance. No private equity control over our public resources.

To our regulators, legislators, and neighbors: the time is now to reject Blackstone’s incursion. Stand on the side of life, of consent, of community. Stand on the side of water protectors and land defenders whose fight is not only righteous – it is essential.

Let us remember the principle: no means no. Free, Prior, and Informed Consent is not a box to check. It is a human right. And it is being violated.

Let Blackstone hear us: New Mexico is not for sale.

Anna Rondon
Gallup, N.M.

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