Worried, excessive, grateful: This is how border residents feel about President Trump’s first 100 days

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BY ALFREDO CORCHADO | Puente News Collaborative

EAGLE PASS — President Donald Trump’s threatened tariffs, attacks on social programs and crackdown on illegal immigration have unsettled some residents along the Texas-Mexico border, a region that overwhelmingly supported his reelection.

Historically Democratic and overwhelmingly Hispanic, border voters flipped in favor of Trump in November, with 12 of Texas’ 14 border counties going to the GOP, up from five in 2016.

As Trump’s second term hits the 100-day mark, that support is sinking, facing pressing challenges. While some voters who supported Trump say they remain confident in his agenda, other say they worry that, beyond border security, the president’s policies do not always align with the complex binational economic realities facing border cities from Brownsville to El Paso, San Diego and beyond.

Nowhere does that seem truer than in Eagle Pass, seat of Maverick County, which in recent years became the epicenter of the migrant crush on the border — and of state and federal efforts to contain it. On some days in the fall of 2023, Eagle Pass — population 26,000 — saw as many as 4,000 migrants cross the border each day.

Residents remember the strangers among them, long lines at international bridges and numbers so big that trade and foot traffic, the lifeline of border communities, were halted so Border Patrol agents could manage the spike in arrivals. The town was overwhelmed.

“It was crazy, crazy,” said Monica J. Cruz, who is running for mayor in the upcoming May 3 city election.

WALKING FINE LINE

Against that backdrop, Trump won Maverick County with 58% of the vote. That reversed decades of Democratic political hegemony in the county, where 94% of residents identify as Latino or Hispanic, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Trump’s local support has faced some headwinds during his first three months in office, as his administration has implemented a whirlwind of policy changes.

The situation is mirrored in the Eagle Pass mayoral race, where the three candidates — Jesus Casas, Aaron Valdez and Cruz — are walking a thin line as they navigate the shifting political climate.

None of the three were openly critical of either Trump or the Democratic Party. They all applauded the improved border enforcement since Trump returned to office — but also said they worry about the economic impact Trump’s threatened tariffs could have on the region.

Casas said there is growing angst in Eagle Pass over the potential tariffs, which could heavily affect trade with Mexico. Texas accounted for about $540 billion of the nearly $900 billion in U.S.-Mexico trade last year, according to U.S. trade figures.

“Part of me thinks the president really does have a plan, that he and the administration know what they are doing. But if that’s so, it’s very important that they communicate the plan to us,” Casas said as he and his competitors politicked recently outside a gym that serves as city’s early voting center. “My concern going into 100 days is tariffs and our relationship with Mexico and Canada. We are all part of North America, and we need to take care of the neighborhood.”

Valdez said he’s worried about the economic impact on Piedras Negras, the much larger city just across the Mexican border from Eagle Pass.

“Mexico, Piedras Negras, is our lifeline, our blood,” he said. “They are more than neighbors. They are family. When they hurt, we hurt even more. I’m worried about the economic uncertainty.”

Jessica Rey Ramon, an Army veteran running for a seat on the Eagle Pass City Council, said she supports the steps the Trump administration and state government have taken to secure the border.

But Ramon questioned the $11.7 billion spent on Operation Lone Star, the state government’s border enforcement effort that has included National Guard troops, state troopers, land barriers and buoys in the Rio Grande. Even now, with migrant encounters less than 35 per day, troops and DPS troopers remain.

“It’s been excessive,” said Ramon, an Army veteran. “There needs to be a better balance.”

Alicia Martinez, a lab technician in Eagle Pass and Ramon’s campaign manager, said her city went “all out” to help migrants “but they never showed any appreciation.”

“Here I am trying to put my own children through school, and our taxes were not going to our community, but for migrants. It was wasteful,” she said.

In his first 100 days, Martinez said, “Mr. Trump has fixed that and I’m grateful.”

EROSION IN SUPPORT?

Trump won 45% of the Latino nationally in November, and he did even better in Texas, taking 55% of the Latino vote, according to exit polls from the Associated Press and CNN.

However, a flurry of polls released between April 21-25 showed a dip in Trump’s approval ratings on some issues. A Fox News poll shows poll found 55% of respondents give him high marks on border security, but that percentage dropped to 38% who said they approved of his performance on the economy, followed by just 33% on tariffs.

Mark Jones, a Rice University political scientist, said while strong support related to security persists for Trump across Texas and in the border counties, there are signs of “erosion of support over more draconian efforts like the deportation of children, U.S. citizens” and deepening worries about Trump’s trade policies.

“The more we see the impact on jobs and prices, the more you can expect that erosion to grow, especially along the border,” Jones said. “Americans vote with their pocketbooks. Americans will always choose cheaper products over rhetoric.”

Separately, a poll by the Pew Research Center shows Trump has a 27% approval rating among Hispanics, a “complete collapse among the fastest growing group of GOP supporters,” wrote GOP political consultant Mike Madrid on Bluesky.

The concerns run from Eagle Pass to Brownsville to El Paso — communities where the federal government plays an outsized role, employing thousands in key jobs, including the U.S. Border Patrol.

Consider Ron Barrio, an El Paso resident and customs broker at a Santa Teresa International Export and Import Livestock Crossing just over the state line in New Mexico. In March, as dust storms swirl, Barrio and his colleagues worried as Trump declared a 25% tariff on imports from Mexico and then rescinded them. The tariff placed on Mexican goods disrupted operations, leading to a steep decline in imports. Barrio, who helps move cattle between the Mexico and the U.S., said he lost more than $70,000.

Barrio describes himself as a “diehard” Trump supporter. He had on display in his office a Trump flag, but after the chaos, the Trump swag didn’t sit well with some money-losing clients, one of whom lost $100,000 in just those three days, he said. Barrio said he quietly rolled up the MAGA flag and put it out of sight, “out of respect for them.”

Still, he said: “I need to give him (Trump) some time and 100 days is not enough. If by the end of the year things don’t look better, I’ll consider my alternatives.”

Daniel Manzanares, director of the Santa Teresa International Export and Import Livestock Crossing, was less optimistic.

“A year?” he asked Barrio. “ The way things are going, we’ll be done by then.”

SHIFTING POLITICAL GROUND

As residents and local leaders sort through the changing political climate, the border has become an even bigger prop, a magnet for politicians looking for a way to shape narratives. Recently, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, facing scandal in Washington, dropped in unannounced in New Mexico to visit troops on the border, standing in front of a tank. TV cameras rolled. A few days later, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem also visited for a few hours. Among her activities: Riding an ATV, picking up dust, with the border wall behind her.

After the “border theater” is installed, it becomes hard to dismantle, cautioned retired educator Jessie F. Fuentes, who has been fighting the state to allow access to the Rio Grande in Eagle Pass. He supplements his income by running a small kayaking tour on the river.

“Once you let them inside your house, it’s tough to kick them out,” he said. “They just won’t leave.”

Throughout the border, where voters shifted to Trump in November, Democratic politicians have been rattled by the shifting political tides.

U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, an El Paso Democrat, said she’s making a point to spend more time at home in her district.

“It has been heartbreaking to see many recent immigrants applaud the Trump administration’s mass deportations,” Escobar told a group of reporters from the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism . “We’ve seen Latino members of our community applaud the militarization of our border without understanding the impact on their own civil liberties … that is the real challenge.”

Weeks after Trump took office, there were protests throughout the Rio Grande Valley over immigration raids at local businesses. The demonstrations highlight how this region is particularly affected by some of Trump’s policies.

“The ethos of the Valley for a long time has been economic vibrancy, largely through immigration and through robust bilateral trade,” said Alvaro Corral, a political science professor at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, in Brownsville. “Whether it’s tariffs, whether it’s deportations, I think that the direction of the Trump administration really is anathema to what the Rio Grande Valley has been for the last 30 years.”

In Del Rio, the end of the migrant rush ripples through the economy, social service agencies and political jockeying. Contract buses that once shuttled thousands of migrants away from the border stand idle. The Val Verde Border Humanitarian Coalition’s migrant processing center sits eerily empty. Only three migrant encounters were reported in Del Rio that one April day. Hotel rooms are again available–sans price-gouging.

And a half-built wall remains unfinished, something that irks Val Verde County Sheriff Joe Frank Martinez. The absence of large numbers of migrants might prove temporary, said Martinez, a Democrat who eked out a narrow victory in November.

Martinez said his path to victory in November was talking with people in H-E-B stores, Whataburger and coffee shops. That can be a lesson to other Democrats in the politically divided region, he said.

“You have to know the people you represent,” Martinez said. “Make sure they understand you will never abandon them. Hold your ground and stand for what you believe in. It’s that simple.”

Freelance Correspondent Gaige Davila contributed from the Rio Grande Valley.

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