A daycare instructor named Gabby Perez engages with young children in a sandbox outside the Turquoise Child Development Center in the tiny city of Tucumcari, which is located in the high desert of eastern New Mexico. On the surface, it appears to be a typical scene with kids, sand, and afternoon light, but the rest of the US is more closely observing this policy experiment than it may acknowledge. New Mexico quietly became the first state in America to provide free childcare to all families, regardless of income, despite previously ranking among the worst in the nation for child poverty and educational outcomes. Additionally, the results are beginning to feel more like an argument than merely a program because they are coming in sooner than most researchers anticipated.
The specificity of the numbers is remarkable. Approximately 63% of four-year-olds and 67% of three-year-olds enrolled in the state’s preschool programs scored “accomplished” for their age in a number of developmental domains by April 2026. In terms of preschool access for three-year-olds, the state rose from rankings that, just a few years ago, put it close to the bottom of almost every pertinent metric to seventh place in the country. New Mexico is now among the few states that can truly claim to be operating a high-quality system rather than just a large one, as it satisfies nine out of ten quality benchmarks established by the National Institute for Early Education Research. Additionally, families save roughly $12,000 per child a year on average. That figure isn’t abstract. That’s a payment for a car. a rent payment. a college semester.
The fact that New Mexico did not accidentally fall into this is what makes its speed unusual and deserving of analysis rather than just celebration. The program’s architecture took more than ten years to develop before it started to show results right away. Thanks to oil and gas revenues, the state’s Land Grant Permanent Fund currently has almost $39 billion. A portion of that fund was allocated to early childhood programs by a 2022 constitutional amendment that was overwhelmingly approved by voters. In 2019, the Department of Early Childhood Education and Care was established.
Providers were able to quickly expand their facilities thanks to a $13 million loan fund. Early childhood educators’ minimum pay rate of $18 per hour, which is modest by any professional standard but a significant floor in a field that has historically paid poverty wages, helped stabilize a workforce that was leaving and burning out. It was no coincidence that employment in the childcare sector has increased by 64% since the program’s expansion. It occurred as a result of someone’s decision to make the position worthwhile.
When something like this happens, it’s easy to project simple optimism onto it. The truth is more nuanced. Demand exceeds infrastructure, as New Mexico still lacks an estimated 15,000 childcare spots. Budget estimates have already been surpassed by the program. A Republican candidate for governor has filed a legal challenge, which is currently pending in state courts. A hearing is set for June. Additionally, Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, who made this initiative a major part of her legacy, is stepping down at the end of this year. It is genuinely unclear whether the next governor, whoever that may be, will continue to have the same political commitment.
Even though the opposition is voicing these concerns in a politically charged manner, it’s possible that they are valid concerns about long-term costs and program design. The opposition may also be underestimating the extent to which this program has become ingrained. It took sixteen years to get here, and House Speaker Javier Martínez, who has seen the issue develop since his days as a community organizer working with immigrant families in Albuquerque, put it simply: he wants to ensure that political weather doesn’t destroy it. Funding for the next five years has already been approved by the Legislature. That is not insignificant.
At the very least, New Mexico has shown that funding structure is more important than most policy discussions realize. States that have attempted to increase early childhood education without a specific, constitutionally protected source of funding have always been at risk from financial strains. Before creating the program, New Mexico created the funding. As dull as it may sound, the most crucial lesson the rest of the nation could learn from this is probably that sequencing. America’s early childhood policy has a long history of well-meaning initiatives followed by covert defunding. It’s difficult to ignore the fact that the states that are doing it correctly are the ones that made the money difficult to take away.
