3/2/16, "Trump dominates in Texas border town where proposed wall would be built," The Guardian, US edition, Tom Dart, Laredo, Texas
"Cruz may have taken the state on Super Tuesday, but Trump’s wins
along border prove he hasn’t been shunned by Latinos despite
controversial immigration plan."
"Donald Trump was embraced on Tuesday by voters in America’s most Hispanic city.
Trump won almost 35% of the Republican primary vote in Webb County, where Laredo is the county seat, comfortably ahead of Marco Rubio (28.4%) and Ted Cruz (28.2%), the Hispanic senator from Texas who finished first in the state overall.
Not that it takes a lot of GOP votes to win here – only 4,089 were cast in the race, compared with nearly 26,000 among Democrats. Laredo is 96% Hispanic or Latino, according to the 2010 census, and it is hugely Democratic: Barack Obama won 77% of the vote in the county in 2012....
Despite the limited GOP voter pool, it is notable – and jarring – that Trump should not only triumph here but generally perform better in border counties than in the Texas interior, where Cruz was in command. After some small-scale polling at the Nevada caucuses, Tuesday’s outcome provided harder evidence that Trump has not been shunned by conservative Latinos. He may even have inspired them into action: he won more votes in Webb County than were cast in its primary in total in 2012.
One Trump voter in Laredo, who gave her name as Cindy, said he is popular with local elderly people who are “tired of the system”....
Trump bested two Hispanic senators who have also talked tough on immigration, in Rubio and Cruz – though both have Cuban heritage, rather than Mexican or Central American, and there is resentment at a US policy that fast-tracks admission and residency for growing numbers of Cubans while migrants from other countries have far bigger hurdles to overcome....
"Donald Trump was embraced on Tuesday by voters in America’s most Hispanic city.
Trump won almost 35% of the Republican primary vote in Webb County, where Laredo is the county seat, comfortably ahead of Marco Rubio (28.4%) and Ted Cruz (28.2%), the Hispanic senator from Texas who finished first in the state overall.
Not that it takes a lot of GOP votes to win here – only 4,089 were cast in the race, compared with nearly 26,000 among Democrats. Laredo is 96% Hispanic or Latino, according to the 2010 census, and it is hugely Democratic: Barack Obama won 77% of the vote in the county in 2012....
Despite the limited GOP voter pool, it is notable – and jarring – that Trump should not only triumph here but generally perform better in border counties than in the Texas interior, where Cruz was in command. After some small-scale polling at the Nevada caucuses, Tuesday’s outcome provided harder evidence that Trump has not been shunned by conservative Latinos. He may even have inspired them into action: he won more votes in Webb County than were cast in its primary in total in 2012.
One Trump voter in Laredo, who gave her name as Cindy, said he is popular with local elderly people who are “tired of the system”....
Trump bested two Hispanic senators who have also talked tough on immigration, in Rubio and Cruz – though both have Cuban heritage, rather than Mexican or Central American, and there is resentment at a US policy that fast-tracks admission and residency for growing numbers of Cubans while migrants from other countries have far bigger hurdles to overcome....
Laredo is a characterful place of bridges and barriers; of ramshackle little homes, pastel-coloured hole-in-the-wall taquerias and family-run auto repair centres, with a decayed downtown of thrift stores, sagging shoe shops, bright currency exchanges and buildings whose grandeur faded long ago.
Laredo’s small-town familiarity and stability is interspersed with with busy crossings, a railway bridge and an interstate highway that barges through the centre of the city to speed trucks northwards where the sprawl subsides into ranchland and flat emptiness and the roving white and green SUVs of the border patrol.
It is the largest inland port on the US-Mexico border, mentioned soon after Los Angeles and New York in scale of international trade. Its population is about 250,000, though the county is vast: two-thirds the size of the LA metropolitan area. It snuggles up to Nuevo Laredo, the more populous and notoriously violent Mexican city on the other side of the serpentine Rio Grande. Laredo’s biggest festival is a near month-long celebration of George Washington’s birthday with a jalapeño-eating contest as its highlight....
While immigration measures naturally have the most profound and immediate impact on border-dwellers, (42 year old corrections officer) Barroso’s reasoning for backing Trump could have come from one of his supporters in Pittsburgh, or Louisville, or Minneapolis. The rationale stems from personality, not policy.
“He’s strong and he’s very confident,” Barroso said. “I don’t support everything he says but a lot of the things, he’s not afraid to say it. I see that as a strong characteristic.”
Laredo experienced Trump’s self-belief and self-promotion up close last July when he paid a brief visit, a month after kicking off his campaign by claiming that Mexico is “sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”
After an outcry, the local border patrol union rescinded its invitation to the candidate, though Trump came anyway – and was shown around by the city’s mayor, a Democrat."...
image above of Laredo, Texas on US map from wikipedia
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Added: "1. A nation without borders is not a nation." Donald J. Trump
"Immigration Reform That Will Make America Great Again," Donald J. Trump
"The three core principles of Donald J. Trump's immigration plan."
"1. A nation without borders is not a nation. There must be a wall across the southern border.
2. A nation without laws is not a nation. Laws passed in accordance with our Constitutional system of government must be enforced.
3. A nation that does not serve its own citizens is not a nation. Any immigration plan must improve jobs, wages and security for all Americans."...
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