Donald Trump falsely tells supporters in New Mexico Hispanics 'want a border wall'

Republicans last won state in 2004

Donald Trump has falsely told supporters in New Mexico that Latinos support his demand for a wall on the southern US border.

In a speech in which he attacked the media for its latest revelations about Supreme Justice Brett Kavanaugh, the president made a play for Latino voters and claimed he could win New Mexico in 2020, a state he lost to Hillary Clinton in 2016 by 48 points to 40. The last Republican presidential candidate to win there was George W Bush in 2004.

“It’s been a while since a Republican won New Mexico,” Mr Trump told a rally at the Santa Ana Star Centre in Rio Rancho, where he was met with chants of “USA, USA”.

“I think we’re going to do great here. We’re here because we really think we’re going to turn this state and make it a Republican state.”

In a clear pitch to Latino voters, he then added Hispanics “want the wall”.

The president’s claims do not appear to be supported by the facts. While around 28 per cent of Hispanics supported Mr Trump in 2016, a similar percentage who voted for Republican candidate Mitt Romney in 2012, there are indications support for him has slipped as a result of his often racist rhetoric over immigrants. Hispanics, along with many members of the general public, have also voiced outrage over his administration’s policy of separating migrant children from their families at the border.

A poll taken this summer, at the time when Mr Trump was at the centre of controversy after telling four congresswoman of colour to “go back home”, found support for the president amid Latinos fell 16 points to just 23 per cent.

At the same time, repeated polls shown that on the issue of a the border all Mr Trump has repeatedly promised to build, there is little support for the project among the country’s Hispanic community.

A Pew survey taken last year showed that while 56 per cent of the public opposed Mr Trump’s idea, as many as 75 per cent of Hispanics were against it. At the same time, 83 per cent said they supported a permanent amnesty for migrants who were brought to the country without papers by their parents – the so-called Dreamers.

After Mr Trump spoke in January from the Oval Office in support of a border wall, Hispanic Federation president José Calderón, said that “the only crisis at the border today is the humanitarian crisis the president has created through his crusade to harm, punish and tear apart immigrant families and communities”.

He said: “Indeed, we have seen first-hand the impact of the president’s actions: families being denied refuge from violence, sons and daughters being separated from their parents, immigrants enduring physical abuse at the hands of law enforcement officials, and migrant children as young as seven dying from dehydration and exhaustion while in US Border Patrol custody.”

Mr Trump’s stop in New Mexico, which has just five presidential electoral college votes, was one of three events planned for the American West. Reports say he will spend the night in the Albuquerque area, then travel to California for a series of fundraising events on Tuesday in Palo Alto and Beverly Hills. The president will then will attend other fundraisers in Los Angeles and San Diego on Wednesday before returning to the capital.

While Democrats were able to win New Mexico without Ms Clinton even bothering to visit the state in 2016, the Trump campaign is seeking any opportunities to put more states in play in what is likely to be a difficult re-election battle for the president.

His campaign said a rally earlier this year in nearby nearby El Paso, Texas, was well attended by female and Hispanic voters, and people who had travelled from New Mexico. Hundreds of people showed up early Monday to claim a place in line ahead of the evening event in Rio Rancho. Protesters, for their part, vowed to step up acts of civil disobedience and demonstrations.

“We have the opportunity because of our fundraising and infrastructure to not only defend the states we carried in 2016, but to extend the map in 2020,” said Rick Gorka, a spokesman for a fundraising committee for Trump’s re-election campaign and the Republican National Committee.

Mr Gorka said New Mexico was a big part of that strategy, as were Minnesota, New Hampshire and Nevada.

Additional reporting by agencies