ROSWELL — Ed the Dairyman says he agrees with Joe the Plumber.

Eddie Schaap, who has been in the dairy business in eastern New Mexico for more than two decades, caught the attention of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin as she spoke to a crowd of about 10,000 supporters Sunday in a Roswell airplane hangar.

Palin not only made a reference to Joe the Plumber, but alluded several times to “Ed the Dairyman” after seeing someone in the crowd holding a sign identifying Schaap that way.

“Barack Obama calls it spreading the wealth. Joe Biden calls higher taxes patriotic,” Palin said during her speech. “But Joe the Plumber and Ed the Dairyman, I believe they think it sounds more like socialism.”

Schaap said Palin’s remark was accurate.

“I watched the Joe the Plumber deal. I’m not in favor of Obama’s tax plan” either, he told the Roswell Daily Record.

Joe Wurzelbacher, a plumber from Holland, Ohio, became famous after he met Obama and said the Democrat’s tax proposal could keep him from buying the two-man plumbing company where he works. Republican presidential nominee John McCain later referred to “Joe the Plumber” several times during a debate with Obama.

Schaap, owner of Northpoint Dairy in Clovis, said his 19-year-old daughter Kayla made the sign that caught Palin’s attention.

“She had “Ed the Dairyman” on one side and “Kayla the Bookkeeper” on the other,” he said.

Starting with just one employee in 1986, Schaap now employs 35 at his dairy. All of his children, including Kayla, work for the family-run business.

Schaap acknowledged that he enjoyed being singled out of the crowd Sunday.

“We were thrilled. It was kind of fun to hear it,” said Schaap, who made the 120-mile drive from Clovis to Roswell with his daughter to show support for Palin.