‘This is a tenth of the trash I pick up every day off my property.’ Jeff’s voice throbs with anger. ‘Every damn day, I’m telling you, and the load never gets any less.’ Everyone in the room cranes their head for a better look. Hogan pulls on a pair of Marigolds and begins plucking the garbage from the table, piece by piece. He holds up a milk carton and stabs a finger at the label. ‘Mexican brands. All of ‘em.’ He reaches for a ball of crumpled newspaper. ‘And this,’ he says, ‘do you know what this is?’

No one speaks.

‘It’s newspaper.’ Hogan has the full attention of the room now. ‘Mexican newspaper and it’s soiled with human refuse.’ For a moment the silence is absolute before it is pierced by the odd manifestations of outrage which gather momentum until they swell into a single long expression of disgust.

Hogan unravels the newspaper, holding it up for everyone to see. ‘This is Mexican shit,’ he cries, ‘and it’s besmirching the face of our own president.’ As one now, the entire front row leans forward to get a better look at the defecated-upon features of Mr Bush.

‘If they would just pick up after them . . .’ a woman in the front row pipes up. ‘I’m sympathetic to their plight, but it ain’t just that it looks bad – the cattle eat that plastic stuff.’

Hogan plucks the repacked rubbish bag from the table and walks round to the front of the stage. ‘Here.’ He thrusts it at the woman, who wrinkles her nose in disgust and quickly plays pass the parcel with the teenager sitting to her left.

‘You want to appreciate what it’s like clearing this day after day? No disrespect, ma’am, but see how you would like it.’ He returns to the table as the bag is handed along and back through the rows like a church collection box.

I’m aware of my own nose wrinkling, yet I’m surprised by the strength of Jeff Hogan’s invective. Texas borders Mexico as much as Arizona and I would have imagined that even up in Houston there would have to be a modicum of peaceful co-existence.

‘It’s time to draw a line in the sand!’ Hogan cries. ‘Either the government must keep these criminals off our private property or I say it falls to the property owners to do it themselves.’

There’s a roar of approval. ‘Who’s for a show of hands?’ Hogan says rousingly. A smattering of hands shoot up, quickly joined by others until the room is a mass of waving arms. I glance over to Duval, but he’s looking to the back of the room where a dim murmur has begun and is rippling through the crowd row by row as a woman pushes her way to the front of the hall.

‘Hey!’ someone shouts. ‘Who asked Nora?’