Gage Skidmore / Creative Commons
The vote was close — 14-13 in favor of continuing to support Trump, according to an El Paso Times reporter’s tweet. (photo cc info)
An effort by some U.S. Border Patrol agents in Southern New Mexico and El Paso, Texas to have their local union reject the national union’s endorsement of Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump has failed.
The Local 1929 union met behind closed doors in El Paso on Tuesday evening. After the meeting, the national Border Patrol union tweeted, “Vote failed. Support of endorsement stands.” The Local 1929 tweeted confirmation: “The membership of Local 1929 has voted to continue its support for NBPC’s endorsement of Donald Trump for President.”
The vote was close — 14-13 in favor of continuing to support Trump, according to an El Paso Times reporter’s tweet. Stu Harris, the local union’s vice president, declined to answer journalists’ questions after the vote, saying interviews would be conducted on Wednesday.
As the El Paso Times reported Monday, some local agents weren’t happy with the Trump endorsement. They gathered letters from more than 20 community leaders in support of their efforts, including two Democrats from Southern New Mexico — state Rep. Bill McCamley, D-Las Cruces, and former Las Cruces City Councilor Nathan Small, a Democratic candidate for a state House seat this year.
“One of the reasons that Las Cruces and El Paso are safe cities, with lower levels of violence compared to peer communities, is because of the trust developed between law enforcement and local communities,” Small’s letter stated. “This trust is built from mutual respect developed through years of outstanding service by law enforcement and a commitment to community engagement. It is hard won but easily lost.”
When it backed Trump in March, the national union acknowledged its longstanding practice of not endorsing in presidential primaries, but said it would not “shy away from voicing our opinions as it pertains to border security and the men and women of the United States Border Patrol.”
“Unlike his opponents, Donald Trump is not a career politician, he is an outsider who has created thousands of jobs, pledged to bring about aggressive pro-American change, and who is completely independent of special interests,” the union said. “We don’t need a person who has the perfect Washington-approved tone, and certainly NOT another establishment politician in the W.H.
“Indeed, the fact that people are more upset about Mr. Trump’s tone than about the destruction wrought by open borders tells us everything we need to know about the corruption in Washington,” the national union said.