A vocal proponent of ending the war in Afghanistan, Lujan joined 57 other members of the House in September 2009 by signing a letter urging the Obama administration against increasing troop levels in the country.

While campaigning in fall 2008, Lujan criticized the $700 billion financial bailout bill, calling it "a hastily developed proposal that lacks oversight and ignores working families." In January 2009, Lujan voted against releasing the second half of the bailout funds.

Land Use

Lujan is a proponent of land conservation. In February 2009, Lujan introduced his first five bills as a freshman House member, four of which dealt with New Mexico water-related issues pertaining to infrastructure, rights. The fifth was a bill that sought to designate nearly 16,000 acres of land in his district as the Sabinoso Wilderness Area. The provisions were incorporated into the 2009 omnibus lands bill.

Lujan supported the May 2009 credit-card reform bill. He was the only member of the New Mexico House delegation to vote against a rider amendment to the bill that allowed guns in national parks.

Lujan authored H.R. 2729, which passed the House in July 2009 and seeks to secure permanent funding for environmental research parks at six national laboratories in his district, including Los Alamos National Laboratory. The Senate has yet to take up the bill.

Energy

Lujan supported the climate-change bill that passed the House in June 2009, saying cutting emissions and supporting new technologies would both curb pollution and create jobs. He added language to the bill that called for the U.S. energy secretary to give special consideration to mostly Hispanic or tribal colleges when creating "Energy Innovation Hubs" with research funding in the bill.

The congressman is a staunch supporter of solar power. Lujan backed a bill that passed the House in October 2009 that would give federal support to the solar industry. Because of the state's 300 days of sunshine every year, he has said that New Mexico has potential to be "aleader in solar energy production."

As chairman of the PRC, New Mexico's utilities board, Lujan championed legislation that required energy providers to get 15 percent of their power from alternative sources by 2015, and raised that to 20 percent by 2020. The PRC opposed efforts to weaken the bill and also wrote rules requiring utilities to use set percentages of solar, wind and other sources of power.

Health-Care Reform

Lujan campaigned for his House seat supporting universal health care and a public option. He supported the House Democrats' health-care reform package that passed the lower chamber in November 2009.

Lujan was the only one of New Mexico's three Democratic freshmen who opposed Rep. Bart Stupak's (D-Mich.) amendment to the health-care bill restricting publicly-funded access to abortions. Lujan also successfully pushed for adding funding for Native American-specific health-care programs.

In July 2009, Lujan said he was against levying additional taxes on the wealthy and small businessowners as a means of paying for a new health-care system. He said any additional taxes should target only the highest 1 percent of earners.

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