A Democratic New Mexico judge who had an alleged Tren de Aragua gang member living in his home has been permanently banned from the bench by his colleagues, according to state Supreme Court documents.

Jose “Joel” Cano resigned in March after agents from the US Department of Homeland Security arrested suspected TdA gang member Cristhian Ortega-Lopez at Cano’s home in February.

The discipline handed down by the Supreme Court of New Mexico makes it so Cano “can never hold a judicial office again, be a candidate for a judicial office, and cannot exercise any judicial authority in the state.”

The ban even prohibits Cano from officiating at weddings in the state.

Ortega-Lopez, 23, was arrested during a Homeland Security raid at the former Doña Ana County Magistrate judge’s on Feb. 28.

The feds also seized four firearms from Cano’s daughter’s home after getting search warrants related to social media evidence of Ortega-Lopez’s alleged ties to Tren de Aragua.

Investigators found pictures on social media of the Venezuelan national eating dinner with Cano’s family and posing for Christmas pictures in 2024. Cano is wearing a cowboy hat and a bolo tie, Ortega-Lopez is wearing a classic New York Yankees baseball cap and a collared shirt that conceals his neck tattoos, the very tattoos that investigators say reveal his gang affiliation.

Cano resigned on March 3 — and made no mention of Ortega-Lopez in his letter.

“Working with each of you has been a very rewarding experience for which I will remain eternally grateful,” Cano wrote. “All the best to everyone of you. I wish all of you a happy retirement once you are ready yourself.”

Cano’s link to Ortega-Lopez, who illegally entered the US in 2023 but was released from a US Customs and Border Patrol facility because of overcrowding, was first revealed in court documents seeking to keep the immigrant in detention.

He had climbed over a barbed-wire fence near Eagle Pass, Texas, and copped to illegally entering the US, the documents said.

Ortega-Lopez first made contact with Cano’s family a little over a year ago when he helped the jurist’s wife Nancy Cano install a glass door. He also did other odd jobs for her.

Nancy offered Ortega-Lopez a place to say in the “casita” of their home in Las Cruces when he got booted from his apartment in El Paso that he shared with five others last April.

While staying with the Canos, he and the judge’s daughter, April Cano, hung out — and she let him hold onto some of her fire arms, court records said.

Ortega-Lopez is charged with being an illegal alien in possession of a firearm or ammunition. If convicted, he could face up to 15 years behind bars