Meet The “Cowboys for Trump”!

Here's more, from local KOAT:

Today a railroad runs through Alamogordo. 

"Alamogordo is 75 miles from the border, but our county line runs to the state line with Texas," said Couy Griffin, an Otero County commissioner. "Our county line is only 5-10 miles from El Paso."

Decades ago, there was a railway that connected several cities, including Alamogordo and El Paso. But these two cities share more than just an old railway. They are both communities impacted by immigration. 

"New Mexico has a lot more skin in this game, than any other state, than any other voting district," Griffin said. 

The commissioner created a group called "Cowboys for Trump." 

"He's standing up for us, he's standing up for the little guys, and we love him for it," Griffin said. "I'm not an emotional guy... but if I could shake his hand and tell him that I thank him, I would do it in a heartbeat." 

Although Otero County doesn't border with Mexico, immigration and the border is still a very big issue for this community. 

"There's coyotes, human traffickers right now, that are doing business as usually along our boot heel cause we don't have a secure border down there," Griffin said. 

Griffin has gone to several events with Democratic lawmakers to make sure the voices of his constituents are heard. 

"We're not racist, and we're not against immigrants, we just want to make sure the people coming into our country and vetted," Griffin said. 

Chris Jones, a member of the Democratic Party of Otero County, feels differently about our immigration situation. 

"There's a lot of hysteria currently over immigration, I do think that the president is exploiting people's fears," Jones said. 

Jones hears a lot of people in Otero County say they aren't anti-immigrant, they just want people to come to the United States legally. 

"My response to that is, 'OK, let's make it legal.' They want to come here to work, we need their labor, issue guest worker cards," said Jones. "Regulate it so we can send those workers where they are needed, and keep those workers from taking jobs from U.S. citizens."

And from local Fox5 in DC:

Cowboys for Trump was an idea turned reality for Couy Griffin and about a dozen of his friends from New Mexico.

"It's a grassroots effort on every front,” Griffin explained.

"I'm really surprised how quickly it came together, we really didn't have a plan,” Griffin said. “We just wanted to show President Trump we support everything he's doing."

Twelve horses were rented from a farm in Cumberland and the cowboys set off on the journey with a small support group that included some of their spouses.

"Plumbers, welders, hat makers and construction workers," Griffin added. "We come from a state that is affected by border security and immigration issues that we are seeing right now."

The 185-mile journey placed the group in the middle of a heavy snowstorm that turned into freezing rain Wednesday, but the group rode on.

“The 15th of February is not the most pleasant time to ride out here in Maryland. We knew that we were going to hit some weather. We knew we’d be faced with some elements. We knew it was going to be snowing and storming on us. But every guy here is cowboy enough to get it done. We rode through the snow, the freezing rain and we did so because we want to stand strong as our president," Griffin said.

Kenney Whetham joined the group only about two days before departure and was surprised by the amount of support they received along the way.

"Riding the C&O canal, some people are like, ‘Hey, that’s where the mules and the horses used to ride and tow the barge. That’s cool to see horseback riders out here,’ and then some of the locals that did ride with us for a while were like, ‘We’ve never ridden the canal. We didn’t know we could,’" Whetham described.

While they’re unsure how or where their ride will end as it approaches the District, they’re not coming empty-handed. They are riding with a custom made hat for President Donald Trump.
"I don't know if we'll get to see him or not, but we're going to find a way to leave him a hat. We'd love to see a picture of him with it on," Griffin said.

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