Forming a Financial Powerhouse
Gilchrist Seeks $500 Million to Fight Government

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/ ... dt.01.html

PILGRIM: In Las Vegas this weekend, the Wake Up America Foundation held a conference addressing the fight against illegal immigration. Open border advocates protested outside the meeting and called the attendees racists. This is the second time in a week meetings dealing with illegal immigration have sparked protests. Five demonstrators were arrested last week in Orange County, California after violence erupted at a conference where the Minuteman Project founder Jim Gilchrist was speaking, and protest organizers say the violence was started when a demonstrator blocking the entrance to the event was hit by a car driven by a meeting attendee.

Jim Gilchrist is the co-founder of the Minuteman Project. He joins me now from Irvine, California, and thanks for being with us.

JIM GILCHRIST, CO-FOUNDER, MINUTEMAN PROJECT: Thank you, Kitty. PILGRIM: You know, this does take away from the message, and yet it seems to be unavoidable at this point. What do you have to say about the violence that's directed against these meetings?

GILCHRIST: Kitty, we've been expecting this. This -- there's a concerted effort to suppress the First Amendment rights of myself, people like Chris Simcox, anyone who's involved in the promotion of enforcement of immigration laws. There's a concerted effort to stifle our First Amendment rights.

I'm not happy about it. We're trying to resolve this.

What happened in Garden Grove was five demonstrators against my 20-minute speech, which had nothing to do with racism. It had to do with recanting what happened in Arizona. We are not a racist group, by the way. And five of those people were charged with felony assault with a deadly weapon. A brick thrown at an 80-year-old woman in her car, right through her windshield. Another 70-year-old man, by the name of Hal, attacked by 12 rowdy people between the ages of 20 and 35, who were trying to smash into his car.

What would you do if you were 70 years old? You would hit the accelerator and get out of dodge. Fortunately, he was not charged with any crime.

PILGRIM: Mr. Gilchrist, we covered the event, and it was remarkably violent. And yet the Minuteman Project was initially accused of being potentially violent, and yet no violence ever occurred as citizens patrolled the border.

How do you deal with this, these accusations versus the reality?

GILCHRIST: Very patiently, very legally, very peacefully. Although I do get hot under the collar at these situations, we do not promote any violence. We do not promote any racism. If you go to the Web site, read it over and over again, if you have to. Not you, Kitty, but your audience, to get the message that we're trying to send.

Our message is: We want to bring national awareness to this critical issue that's affecting this country, and we want to bring this nation back under the rule of law.

PILGRIM: You have been approached by several different groups hoping to form their own groups for border patrol. Do you think they should be united? Should individuals start other groups? What's your position on this?

GILCHRIST: Yes, and that's what we expanded on. We developed a vast network in Las Vegas. We had representatives from New Hampshire, Florida, Washington state and California, all four corners of the country. We also resolved to start a new operation, which is to cut, literally cut off donations of campaign funds to candidates or organizations who are not supporting the simple enforcement of U.S. immigration laws. There's about $1.5 billion a year that end up in political coffers annually, I've been told. We are going to tap into that treasure chest. We are going to expect about $500 million in otherwise -- money that would otherwise go to campaign contributions, and we're going to develop a powerhouse, a financial powerhouse in order to compete with our own government.

PILGRIM: OK, Jim Gilchrist, thank you very much for joining us tonight.

GILCHRIST: Thank you.