McALLEN, Texas—Sun, sky, and desert are constant companions for the residents of the southwestern borderlands of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona.
How people living in borderland states vote stands to be crucial in the upcoming presidential race and could determine which party controls Congress. The presidential race between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris is likely to impact down-ballot races in the House.
Voters interviewed by The Epoch Times described their top concerns and how their lives have been impacted over the past four years.
Some expressed worry and frustration about the economy, the border, and the country itself. They want change in 2024.
Texas
Traveling south on U.S. 281 into the Rio Grande Valley offers clues about how folks in the Lone Star State feel about the election.South Texas is still cowboy country where cattle outnumber people by a long shot. In a vast pasture alongside the highway, motorists are greeted by giant Trump flags waving in the breeze with slogans like “Take America back 2024” and “Jesus is my savior. Trump is my president.”
Texas Congressional District 34 extends from Kingsville 120 miles south to the border town of Brownsville, taking in Harlingen and parts of McAllen—all home to a large Hispanic population.
It is a closely watched race; Trump’s dominance in Texas could help the Republicans flip the district red.
The race is a rematch between Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez, the incumbent, and former Republican Rep. Mayra Flores.
Gonzalez, a moderate, beat Flores by 8.5 points in 2022. However, the Cook Political Report rated the race “Lean Democrat.”
Flores, a legal immigrant from Mexico who is married to a Border Patrol agent, won a special election to fill the vacant seat temporarily in 2022 but lost to Gonzalez in the general election.
Latinos Embrace Trump
Take 82-year-old Minerva Perez, who lives in Brownsville with family about five miles from the Mexican border.After voting for Democrats all her life, she said this year she’s voting straight Republican. She believes Trump can reduce sky-high food prices and stop illegal immigration.
Her entire family is voting for Trump this time too, she said.
“I want changes,” she said. “I’m going to vote Republican.”
She’s seen a lot of illegal immigrants in Brownsville, with many more being processed in McAllen.
“They give them money, phones,” she said. “They fly them everywhere, and if I need something, I have to pay for it.”
“I’m seeing a lot of things that are wrong,” she said, adding that crime worries her too.
Perez said she moved in with family after a home invasion. A man broke into her house and nearly beat her to death four years ago.
She fought him with a pipe in her kitchen, she said, but he wrestled it away and turned it on her, landing blows to her head and face.
“It was like 45 minutes that I fought him, but I’m alive because of God,” she said.
Outside McAllen, in the small town of Donna, Tina White, 52, and her friend Michelle Lopez, 47, were sitting at the community park waiting for a bus. Both said they preferred Trump because of his business experience and because they felt better off while he was in office.
Lopez said she is voting for Trump for the first time, and her family, including her cousins, are voting for him as well. She and her family are worried about the direction the country’s going.
Lopez said she’s battling cancer but can’t get the health care she needs, yet illegal immigrants are getting it for free.
About 100,000 illegal immigrants who were brought to the United States as children will be able to enroll in a health care plan next year under a Biden administration directive announced in May.
White, a transplant from the Chicago area, has lived in South Texas for 20 years. Not so long ago, she was homeless and living on the streets. She understands people want a better life in America, but she said the sheer number of illegal immigrants has diverted resources away from U.S. citizens.
“They get free houses. ... And the Americans in the United States are upset,” she added.
White said electing Harris, the Democratic nominee for president, would not change anything. Race relations went downhill under President Barack Obama, White said, and the same thing would happen under Harris.
“We need the right woman president,” White said. “I don’t believe we need her, because she is a derivative of Barack Obama.”
God and Groceries
Around the corner from the stoplight and a roadside market filled with yard art and pottery, 67-year-old George Crocker said this election is about good versus evil.He doesn’t understand how Democrats can run on the idea of abortion, he said.
“Everybody’s turned against God. They have hardly any morals at all anymore,” Crocker said.
But there are practical concerns as well, Crocker said.
Everybody’s talking about grocery prices, he said. When he went shopping two weeks ago, he bought a pork loin for $7. But on his last trip to the grocery store, the same pork loin was $10.
“It’s just getting outrageous,” he said.
But the biggest issue for most South Texans is the border crisis, he said.
Character Matters
Kingsville is at the northern end of District 34. It was named after the founder of the famed King Ranch, a sprawling 825,000-acre mega-ranch larger than the land area of Rhode Island.The town, with its population of almost 25,000, is home to Texas A&M University, Kingsville. Harris signs are plentiful around town.
Not far off a main road, Ernesto Alonzo Chapa of Kingsville was watering his plants at the end of a hot day. Here in South Texas, temperatures in early autumn easily make it into the 90s.
Chapa took a few minutes to talk about the election and his lifelong loyalty to the Democratic Party. The 63-year-old retired plumber doesn’t trust Trump or like him.
He believes Harris and the Democrats will do more to help people and are more respectful of their issues, such as abortion access for women.
On the state and local level, he said he will be voting straight Democrat.
Chapa thinks both parties need to stop mass immigration. He believes Trump would shut the border down, but so would Harris.
He said crime was a concern even in his small town. There was a murder there not long ago allegedly involving an illegal immigrant, he said.
“It is scary,” Chapa said. “He had less than $3; they stabbed him right in his driveway, in his car. He was cleaning out his car.”
While Trump was successful in quelling mass migration while in office, Chapa said he didn’t like how Trump treated people looking for a better life.
He blamed Trump for putting children in so-called “cages.” Trump had continued to use chain-link facilities built for illegal immigrants under the Obama administration.
Chapa disapproved of Trump’s tactic of separating children from parents at the border. Chapa does not like how Trump spoke out against a bipartisan border bill.
The bill would have provided more resources and agents and sped up asylum screenings to address the crisis.
Another huge issue for Chapa is Jan. 6, 2021. He condemned Trump for waiting three hours to speak out against the Capitol breach.
New Mexico
Saw-tooth mountains pierce the cloudless blue sky on the way to Las Cruces in the Land of Enchantment. Interstate 10, heading north from Texas, cuts through the Tularosa Basin, home of the White Sands Missile Range.But even in the middle of a desert, the political tug-of-war is on display.
“Trump’s Project 2025 will cut Medicaid. It’s OK to vote for Democrats,” reads one billboard message.
Las Cruces lies in the state’s 2nd Congressional District, which borders Mexico.
Political pundits say the race is a nail-biter. The Hispanic majority district is similar to Congressional District 34 in Texas.
In New Mexico’s 2nd Congressional District, the incumbent, Democratic Rep. Gabe Vasquez, is trying to fend off former Republican Rep. Yvette Herrell.
Harrell held the seat for a single term ending in 2023 before being ousted by Vasquez.
Senior Survival
Just outside Las Cruces, Susan Seggerman, 70, was sitting on her front porch as the sun set, the golden light giving way to purple shadows.Seggerman, a disabled veteran, described her struggle with rising food and electricity prices over the past four years.
“It’s the worst it’s ever been,” she said, her voice quivering. “We’re having a hard time. I’ve been crying all day.”
She and her husband, who is also disabled, want to sell their New Mexico home and move to a small house in Illinois, where she’s from.
As she looked at her dirt yard, Seggerman apologized for the lack of grass. She said she couldn’t water it because she can’t move the sprinkler around.
Seggerman said she dreads ordering groceries and is worried that food prices will be higher again.
“Even at Walmart, the milk has gone up from $1.67 for a half gallon to $1.92,” she said.
She hated to complain because she knew people out there had it worse, like hurricane survivors in North Carolina.
Rising crime concerns her, she said. Thieves hit her home, stealing a compressor and orchard blower. She’s constantly seeing notices on Ring, a video monitoring app, of others reporting thefts and stolen cars.
Seggerman frowned, worried it would get worse as more illegal immigrants come into the country.
“They don’t have jobs; they can’t speak the language; they don’t have houses, cars, whatever, unless they’re given stuff,” she said.
She believes some illegal immigrants will turn to crime in order to survive.
Seggerman registered as a Democrat but said she’s been voting Republican since 2016 when Trump took office. She plans to vote for Trump this time, but she may not vote straight Republican.
She’s not crazy about the way Trump talks sometimes, but she’s voting for policy, not personality.
Harris Better Than Biden
On the south side of Las Cruces near Mesilla, former mayor and state representative Ruben Smith expressed optimism in the Democrats’ chances of flipping Congress blue.Smith, a lifelong Democrat, said the momentum behind Harris after she replaced President Joe Biden at the top of the ticket was encouraging for the Democrats.
“It’s the best thing that could have happened to us,” he said.
To him, Harris is the more “authentic” candidate, while Trump comes across as an “angry” man.
Smith said the No. 1 issue for counties along the New Mexico border with Mexico is illegal immigration, followed by the economy and health care.
Locally, he noted the positive economic impact of migrants. He said people mistake the homeless population in town for illegal immigrants.
“We need workers, and we don’t have them, and the immigrants are filling that need,” he said.
He takes issue with Trump’s assertion that foreign nationals have caused crime and problems such as in Springfield, Ohio, where some 20,000 Haitian immigrants have been placed.
Those reports were wildly overblown, he said.
Still, he concedes that the border and the economy are Harris’s vulnerabilities. While she has convinced some voters that she will handle the border crisis, many are looking to Trump to fix it.
He’s seeing the same issue with the economy, which is doing better than it was, but it has yet to sink in for most people, he said.
The most significant change in his life over the past four years has been the polarization of politics.
“Because of the political upheaval that Trump has brought, it’s affected many, many close friendships, and it’s unfortunate,” he said.
In the end, he believes Harris will win in what is likely to be a very close election.
Elections Have Consequences
In the town of Truth or Consequences, 70-year-old Louanne Johnson, an outspoken Democrat, said only Harris is fit to be president.“Our president should be someone people can look up to,” she said.
Johnson said she’s voting for Harris, not just against Trump. Nevertheless, she ticked off a litany of alleged offenses that Republicans have ignored about their candidate: Trump is disrespectful. Trump is vulgar. Trump is a criminal.
She recalled that in 2020, Trump supporters in town with flags on their pickups encircled her vehicle, which had a Biden sticker on it. She viewed the incident as an intimidation.
Life with a Democrat in the Oval Office has been a refreshing change for her. Under Biden, she is making more money as an online college teacher. She trusts the Democrats to help people get paid better wages, support education, and make life safer for immigrants, minorities, and those who are gay.
People who say they are worse off financially under Biden are “ill-informed,” she said.
“I don’t spend any more money on groceries than I used to, but I don’t buy beer, potato chips, alcohol, or meats,” she said.
Johnson pointed out that the stock market hit several record highs in the last year, and inflation is down.
The one concern she shares with Republicans is the border. But she doesn’t trust Republicans to fix it.
“I think the border is a mess, but it’s a mess because Republicans will not work with Democrats to solve it,” she said.
At the Sierra County Fair going on in town, Doré Montroy, 67, wore a Veterans for Trump cap while he stopped by the fair.
The truth is he doesn’t believe Trump will win in November, but he’s voting for him anyway.
Trump recently announced he would not tax senior citizens’ Social Security income. Montroy believes Trump did an excellent job in his first term and hopes he will do more for seniors and veterans if he pulls off a win.
Arizona
A long ribbon of highway runs through the Chihuahuan Desert, leading into Arizona.Scrub brush punctuates the lonely terrain, stretching ever westward along Interstate 10 as dust devils dance in the distance.
San Simon, with a population of 230, is in the middle of nowhere, just across the Arizona state line in the 6th Congressional District.
Like similar districts in Texas and New Mexico, the 6th in Arizona, a critical swing state nationally, is a toss-up.
Republican Rep. Juan Ciscomani, the incumbent, faces Democratic challenger Kirsten Engel in a toss-up race.
The winner will likely ride to victory on the coattails of Trump or Harris, depending on who carries the state.
Veronica Mora Huff, 34, and Elicia Guzman, 22, work at the 9 Acre Travel Complex off Interstate 10 in this small desert town.
Both women are frustrated with illegal immigration and the high cost of living under the current administration.
Huff, whose family is Mexican-American, said she and her husband work hard, but they are struggling to raise their children while foreign nationals have it easier.
“My husband works seven days a week. I work five days a week. We have three daughters,” she said. “We barely get by, and it’s not right because we do what we’re supposed to as Americans.”
Huff said things have changed dramatically when it comes to illegal immigration. What used to be Mexicans crossing the border has now turned into people from all over the world coming in.
Also, it bothers her that countries like Ukraine and Israel are getting money that could be used here at home.
“I think that every country needs to deal with their own problems,” she said. “There’s a lot of people here that need help.”
Huff said the area is split between Democrats and Republicans. While she used to be an independent, she now supports Trump because she was better off when he was president.
Guzman considers herself an independent but doesn’t think she will vote because she hasn’t studied the candidates enough. Like her coworker, she doesn’t like the idea of illegal immigrants getting benefits such as health care. Guzman tried to get affordable health care herself but said she didn’t qualify.
“I was apparently making too much (money). I made over just what the requirements are,” she said.
Guzman said there’s even talk of a medical clinic, especially for illegal immigrants, being built in the town of Wilcox, home to a U.S. Customs and Border Protection station.
“It makes me upset because all these people from everywhere else can come, and they can get insurance, just like nothing,” she said.
Stuck in the Middle
In a suburb outside Tucson, 43-year-old Joshua Goodman was out in the yard putting up Halloween decorations for his kids.Goodman is an independent. He has yet to decide which candidates will get his vote. He studies each race and votes for the one that matches his values and addresses his concerns.
“This year, it’s going to boil down to people like me,” he said of control of Congress and the White House. “I flip back and forth; I don’t have a political allegiance.”
Goodman said his finances have gotten tighter over the past four years. He wants to move, but he can’t afford a mortgage with the current high rates hovering around 8 percent.
Inflation ties in with the country’s biggest problem, which is the open southwestern border, he said.
“We’ve got to shut it down,” he said.
If Harris wants to use taxpayer dollars to build affordable homes, then she needs to stop letting illegal immigrants into the country, he said.
Goodman complained about the price of groceries and eating out. He paid $3.33 plus tip for coffee, toast and grits at a local eatery. He recently priced a six-piece Happy Meal at $10.32.
“How can a family of four go out to eat?” he asked.
He believes Obama was one of the best presidents in recent years. Yet he voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020.
He doesn’t like the idea of Harris giving out sex changes for prisoners or pushing for gun control. He doesn’t trust Harris, but he said he doesn’t trust Trump either.
When it comes to down-ballot races, such as the 6th Congressional District, Goodman is unsure if he wants one party to control everything.
A Woman President
In a little house not far from the University of Arizona in Tucson, Denny Graham sat on his front porch in the 100-degree heat to discuss his views as a staunch Democrat.The 89-year-old retired professor of engineering said life has mostly stayed the same for him under the Biden–Harris administration.
He doesn’t have a fancy house or need a lot of money. His investments have done well, so inflation has been manageable for him.
“I have happy hour on my porch every day at 5 p.m.,” he said with a smile.
He chats a bit about his family, his life, and his hobby of making prickly pear juice from the cacti in his yard.
Graham said immigration needs to be controlled, but immigrants are beneficial to the U.S. economy because they help harvest crops and take jobs Americans don’t want.
While there may be resentment against mass immigration, everyone deserves to be treated humanely, he said.
“These immigrants are human beings,” he said. “Should they suffer more than you or me?”
Harris is the superior candidate compared with Trump, Graham said.
Harris stands for women’s rights, he said, adding that she has accomplished much in her career, from being a California prosecutor to becoming a U.S. senator and vice president.
He marveled at the changes he'd seen in his lifetime for women’s rights and wondered if he would see the first woman president of the United States.
He recalled that when he graduated from high school, no women in his class went to college. Now, more women than men attend universities.
Graham speaks wistfully of what future decades will be like in America, acknowledging he won’t live to see it.
“The only thing that pisses me off about dying is I’m not going to see what’s going to happen. Think about the changes we’re going to experience in the next 50 years. It’s unbelievable,” he said.
