Gifts from governor
Susana Martinez presents President Obama with a Lobos jersey and a piece of the original floor of the Pit
Gov. Susana Martinez greeted President Barack Obama and his family on their arrival in New Mexico on Friday and gave the president a piece of the state’s sporting history.
Martinez gave Obama, a noted basketball fan, a University of New Mexico Lobos hoops jersey and a framed piece of the floor of the original Pit, an iconic venue in which the 1983 NCAA basketball championship game was played. The venue is now formally known as WisePies Arena aka The Pit.
As she had for a previous Obama trip to New Mexico in 2012, Martinez, who was accompanied by her husband, Chuck Franco, and Roswell Mayor Dennis Kintigh greeted the president shortly after the Obamas deplaned in Roswell on Friday afternoon.
Kintigh, a former state legislator, described the brief visit with the first family as “very nice, very gracious” and said it did not include any serious policy talks.
He also said President Obama jokingly asked him during their chat about UFO sightings in Roswell, to which Kintigh said he told the president that he could not divulge specifics.
“It’s Roswell; everybody asks that,” Kintigh told the Journal.
President Obama and his family, including his daughters, Sasha and Malia, and wife, first lady Michelle Obama, were in the state visiting Carlsbad Caverns to celebrate the National Park Service centennial.
Meanwhile, the Governor’s Office also released a statement from the two-term Republican governor on Obama’s visit.
“I may not agree with the president’s politics, and I’ve been routinely critical of the federal government’s overreach on many issues in New Mexico,” Martinez said. “But I very much appreciate the President of the United States visiting New Mexico and shining a spotlight on one of the state’s treasures — Carlsbad Caverns. He and his family will certainly experience what ‘New Mexico True’ is all about.”
New Mexico True is the state’s tourism slogan and has been at the center of an aggressive marketing campaign.