Thread: The Govinator talks about Immigration

The Terminator talks about immigration




He's probably the most powerful immigrant in politics. In fact, some say if it wasn't for the minor constitutional detail that only U.S.-born citizens can run for president, he would make a viable candidate for the White House.

We're talking about the Arnold, the Terminator, the governor of California. And now Gov. Schwarzenegger is weighing in on immigration. In Ruben Navarrette's column in the San Diego Union-Tribune, the former blockbuster actor had some interesting -- and personal thoughts about the issue. He talked about some of the hostility he encountered when he came to America decades ago.

"I felt a little bit of prejudice, people saying 'What's the Nazi doing here?' and stuff like that. They imitated my accent, and made jokes about it, and they came into the gym sometimes and said, 'Heil Hitler.'"

After addressing policy issues surrounding immigration, Navarrette asked the governor "whether there wouldn't still be some people upset that these immigrants were here -- legally or not -- because of the impact on the culture."

"I would say that there would always be a problem," he said. "There is always a certain percentage of people who just don't like foreigners. "But that's OK. That's not the problem that we have right now. The problem we have right now is that, every single day, you hear about illegals, people coming in here illegally."

That creates hostility, he said. Yet, unlike the nativists, Schwarzenegger doesn't blame the immigrants themselves. Contrary to the popular myth that illegal immigrants cut in line, the governor realizes that there is no line -- not if you're poor and from a country where the number of people who want to come to the U.S. far exceeds the visa allotment.

"Those people didn't choose (to come illegally)," he said. "It's the only way they can get in here. ... It's not like you can stand in line and wait a few days and then you can get in. There's no way. There is a system that has been created on purpose to look the other way and to bring them in because everyone knows that we cannot function without them."

Immigration Chronicles: The Terminator talks about immigration

"Those people didn't choose (to come illegally)," he said

HUH? Absolute proof that Arnold is stupid. No, of course not, they didn't decide to come illegally. Some Ferengi force from Zoltan sent invader rays into their heads and that's what caused them to illegally immigrate.

As one Californian to my govenor-these people did choose to come here illegally, they have a choice-apply for a visa like the immigrants who want to add something to our country, who appreciate the opportunity to be found here, and assimilate, become Americans.

"These people" chose to break our laws.

Do any of you truly believe that when Arnold came to this country someone called him a Nazi... dont you people remember the movie "Pumping Iron" the man had muscles on Muscles

I think this is a load of SH_T and if you people believe it you deserve all the SH_T these people feed you

Those people didn't choose (to come illegally),"

They had 3 choices, come here Legally, Illegaly or stay home where you belong.

There is a system that has been created on purpose to look the other way and to bring them in because everyone knows that we cannot function without them."

*cough* *cough*

I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.
Abraham Lincoln

Originally Posted by MyAmerica

There is a system that has been created on purpose to look the other way and to bring them in because [quote:1wd0bd82]everyone knows that we cannot function without them."

*cough* *cough*

I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.
Abraham Lincoln[/quote:1wd0bd82]

That's an Insult if you ask me!

As California struggles to maintain any sense of American roots, someone like him is out to destroy not only California but the nation. I guess that is what happens when you marry a Kennedy.

That creates hostility, he said. Yet, unlike the nativists, Schwarzenegger doesn't blame the immigrants themselves. Contrary to the popular myth that illegal immigrants cut in line, the governor realizes that there is no line -- not if you're poor and from a country where the number of people who want to come to the U.S. far exceeds the visa allotment.

"Those people didn't choose (to come illegally)," he said. "It's the only way they can get in here. ... It's not like you can stand in line and wait a few days and then you can get in. There's no way. There is a system that has been created on purpose to look the other way and to bring them in because everyone knows that we cannot function without them."
.................................................. .................................................. ....
There were enough "nativists" who didn't have a problem with foreigners to vote this guy into the governor's office but if they had known that he called us nativists and that he has the same mentality that the illegals have ....he would not be governor today. And , yes, they did have a choice. People waited in line for years not days to come to this country. I can't believe what I'm hearing. And no, he would not have made it to the white house.

What a two-faced hypocrite! Check out this article from 2005...how things have changed! Somehow...I really think he is anti-illegal...but he's a wimpy toad!


Governor pushes immigrant hot button
John Wildermuth and Mark Martin, Chronicle Political Writers

Sunday, May 1, 2005


It was 11 years ago that Republican Pete Wilson rode public fears about illegal immigration into a second term as governor. Now Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is picking up where Wilson left off.

With polls showing Schwarzenegger's once gaudy approval ratings skidding below 50 percent, the governor is using the hot-button immigration issue to reconnect with conservative voters.

Thursday, for example, Schwarzenegger called a conservative talk radio show in Los Angeles to blast a local Spanish-language television station for a billboard that "promotes illegal aliens to come in here, and that's the last thing we need.''

He went on to praise the controversial Minuteman Project, saying the group has done "a terrific job," by putting hundreds of armed civilians in Arizona to stop illegal immigrants from crossing the Mexican border.

The governor's aides denied that Schwarzenegger is looking at the immigration issue as a cure-all for his growing political problems.

"It was not (Schwarzenegger) who brought up immigration,'' said Margita Thompson, a spokeswoman for the governor.

"If he gets asked a question, he answers it.''

It was the governor's staff, however, who called KFI radio Thursday and said Schwarzenegger wanted to talk about the billboard, which had been a cause celebre in California conservative circles.

The freeway billboard, designed to promote the evening newscast on a local Spanish-language station, featured a picture that dropped a Mexico City monument into downtown Los Angeles and the words "Los Angeles, CA," with the "CA" crossed out and replaced with a red "Mexico."

The governor wasn't looking for a reasoned discussion of the billboard when he jumped into the fray.

Los Angeles residents have "all reason to be angry" about the billboard, which should be taken down immediately, Schwarzenegger said. "When you're here, you should be a Californian.''

Schwarzenegger and his aides and consultants know the political heat immigration issues kindle in Los Angeles, a city whose 746,000-student school district was 73 percent Latino and 9 percent white in 2004.

"All you have to do is drive in Los Angeles in the afternoon and listen to talk radio,'' said Harry Pachon, president of the Tomas Rivera Policy Institute, a Latino issues think tank at the University of Southern California. "The No. 1 and No. 2 stations are anti-immigrant, all day, every day.''

John and Ken, the drive-time DJs who interviewed Schwarzenegger on Thursday, are among the conservative talk show hosts who promoted a high-profile immigration reform drive that sent a group to Washington, D.C., last week to lobby Congress for tougher laws against illegal immigrants.

It doesn't take much imagination to hear echoes of Republican Wilson's 1994 charges against Democrat Kathleen Brown in the governor's campaign when Schwarzenegger talks derisively about immigration supporters "who want us to take the rest of the border guards away so everyone can come over who wants to come over.''

When Schwarzenegger, who immigrated more than 25 years ago to the United States from Austria, described his shock at seeing a Fox News video "of hundreds and hundreds of illegal aliens coming across the border,'' there was an eerie similarity to Wilson's famous campaign ad showing grainy footage of people sprinting across the border as an announcer solemnly intoned, "They keep coming.''

Wilson's 1994 re-election campaign was in desperate shape when he hugged the immigration issue like a lonely life preserver on a storm-tossed sea. California's economy was in tatters, the schools were in financial trouble and Brown, the state treasurer with a famous political name, had a 23-percentage-point lead in the polls.

Wilson needed to change the subject of the campaign debate and Proposition 187 gave him a way to do it. The initiative would have barred undocumented immigrants from public schools and kept them from receiving anything but emergency services from the state.

"Wilson wants to use the money spent on illegals to take care of California's kids,'' an ad for the governor said. "Kathleen Brown thinks differently."

"The schools were bad and the economy was bad, so Wilson didn't want to focus on them,'' said Mark DiCamillo of California's Field Poll. "So he raised the shadow of illegal immigration and connected himself to Proposition 187."

It worked. By election day, illegal immigration was the most important issue for voters, who gave Wilson a surprisingly easy 55 percent to 41 percent win over Brown and an even bigger 59 percent to 41 percent victory to Prop. 187.

Prop. 187 was soon blocked by the courts and never took effect, but Wilson was back in the Capitol for four more years.

Fast forward 11 years. The state today is in serious financial trouble. There's not enough money for the schools, and the Republican governor's popularity has taken a hit from many of the same Democrats and independents who backed the former Hollywood star-turned politician in the 2003 recall vote.

For Schwarzenegger, the Wilson political playbook must have a certain allure. It probably looks even better to his advisers, many of whom worked for Wilson not that long ago.

Illegal immigration is an important issue in the state, especially in voter-heavy Southern California. Providing services for undocumented residents costs the state billions each year, with little of it reimbursed by the federal government. As Schwarzenegger's defenders are quick to remind Democrats lashing out at the governor, even Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and San Francisco's own Sen. Dianne Feinstein have called for tighter controls on the borders.

"Illegal immigration is of grave importance,'' said Thompson, Schwarzenegger's spokeswoman. "The governor has continually called on the federal government to assume full responsibility for the state's costs.''

Hammering on the need to block illegal immigration is good government, regardless of the politics, said former GOP Assemblyman Howard Kaloogian, whose group, Move America Forward, supports immigration reform.

"Until our borders are secure, it has to be talked about,'' he said.

As for the billboard, there are plenty of Latinos who winced at "Los Angeles, Mexico."

"The billboard was insensitive,'' said Pachon of the Tomas Rivera institute. "It didn't take into account the political realities of Southern California.''

But there are few Latinos -- and even fewer Democrats -- who believe Schwarzenegger has jumped into the immigration battle by accident.

"It's a measure of just how desperate the governor is," said Assemblyman Dave Jones, D-Sacramento. "It appears to me that he is very deliberately trying to raise this whole set of issues. There is a deliberate effort to try and shift the debate about the things he's trying to do in California because the people are rejecting those things.''

But today's California isn't the California of 1994 and many credit much of the change to Wilson's 1994 campaign.

"We call Proposition 187 'The Pete Wilson Citizenship Promotion Act of 1994,' '' said Mark Silverman, director of immigration policy for the Immigrant Legal Resource Center in San Francisco.

Voting rights activists used Prop. 187 to energize California's Latino community, arguing they had to become more involved in the politics of the country where they lived.

"Latinos used to say they didn't become citizens because 'no quiero pisar a mi bandera,' which means 'I don't want to step on my flag,' '' Silverman said. "I haven't heard that since 1994.''

Since 1994, close to 1 million Latino immigrants have become citizens. In that 1994 state election, 9 percent of the voters were Latino. Last November, that number doubled to 18 percent.

Just as important, from a political standpoint, is that most of those new citizens aren't Republicans. Latino voters, who before 1994 leaned only slightly toward the Democratic Party, are now going for California Democrats 2-to-1 or better.

Schwarzenegger "is treading in a minefield,'' Pachon said.

While the anti-illegal immigrant campaign was a winner for Wilson, it has devastated his party's standing with the state's fastest-growing ethnic group.

"The unfortunate part of Prop. 187 was that it became so polarizing that it became seen as anti-Latino,'' said Sal Russo, a longtime Republican consultant. "There are a lot of divisions between legals and illegals, but if something is seen as an attack on the Hispanic community, they are united.''

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