SANTA FE, N.M.— In response to challenges from environmental groups and frontline community members and a massive public outcry, the New Mexico Water Quality Control Commission late Thursday rejected an oil industry effort to reuse toxic liquid waste off the oil field.

The dismissal follows evidence that interference from the governor’s office — including emails expecting commissioners to support the petition — compromised the integrity of the proceeding.

“This is a huge victory for clean water,” said Mario Atencio, a participant in the rulemaking from the Eastern Navajo Agency. “Fracking waste has no place in our rivers, on our crops or in our bodies. While our governor is at COP touting false solutions to the climate crisis as she oversees oil and gas expansion, we’re here defending our land, air and water from toxic oil and gas pollution.”

The dismissal is the latest defeat for the oil industry’s wildly unpopular proposal to discharge treated oil and gas waste onto soil, into surface and groundwater, and use it to water non-food crops.

In May, following an exhaustive 18-month rulemaking process, the commission banned the reuse and dumping of oil and gas waste in rivers and on land because it found no evidence that the waste could be treated and safely reused outside oil fields. Then, in July, under intense pressure from the governor’s office, the commission reversed course and accepted an oil industry proposal to undo those protections.

Public outcry intensified when emails showed Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s office directed a majority of the panel’s members to support the oil industry petition. The Center and others filed motions to dismiss the oil industry petition because political interference had compromised the commission’s fairness and impartiality.

“The commission made the right call by shutting down the oil industry's push to dump toxic drilling waste into our rivers and onto our land,” said Colin Cox, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Every New Mexican can be relieved knowing that commissioners stood their ground and didn't cave to the heavy political pressure coming directly from the fossil fuel industry and the governor's office.”