First We Bombed New Mexico will have its West Coast Premiere at the Palm Springs International Film Festival on January 8, 2024. Director Lois Lipman’s documentary delves into the victims of Trinity Bomb, which caused radiation damage to Native and Hispanic communities.

“The film follows inspiring New Mexico heroine Tina Cordova and her decade-long quest for justice – and the truth – as she catalyzes a grassroots movement of local Hispanic and Native American mothers seeking compensation from Congress for generations of cancers caused by Trinity’s radioactive fallout that covered their land with a strange, warm snow-like substance.

First We Bombed New Mexico exposes the gripping untold story of multigenerational cancers and abandonment suffered by local communities in New Mexico since the 1945 Trinity Bomb detonation in their state. A history of nuclear colonialism and environmental racism in New Mexico is witnessed as we learn the impact the secret Trinity Bomb inflicted on its residents of color, including a spike in the deaths of newborns shortly after the blast. Amid resurging domestic and global nuclear threats, the film starkly reminds us that radiation doesn’t respect national borders, bringing home the frightening realization that we are all downwinders.”

In October 2023, the film had its World Premiere in New Mexico at the Santa Fe International Film Festival where it was honored with the 2023 Audience Choice Best Competition Documentary. Later in October 2023, it screened at the Austin International Film Festival, where it was the Winner of the Documentary Feature Jury Award 2023.

Check out the film’s trailer below: