Robert Salladay (Los Angeles Times): Polls Push Governor to the Border

[Jack Rabbit]

From the Los Angeles Times
Dated Saturday April 30

Polls Push Governor to the Border
As his popularity wanes, Schwarzenegger revisits a Republican mainstay: illegal immigration
By Robert Salladay, Times Staff Writer

Sacramento — If Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's decision to speak out forcefully against illegal immigration seems familiar, it is. The governor is using a well-worn tactic to seize public attention amid plummeting approval ratings, analysts and others said Friday.

Speaking to reporters, Schwarzenegger on Friday likened the armed Minuteman group that has roamed the Arizona-Mexico border looking for illegal immigrants to a "neighborhood patrol" that has succeeded where the government failed. A day earlier, he called their work "fantastic" and chastised the Bush administration for failing to secure the border.

Schwarzenegger also had said Thursday that a Spanish-language billboard characterizing Los Angeles as a Mexican city was "divisive," a comment echoed by conservative groups. Last week, the governor said the U.S. should "close the borders" — a remark his staff said was imprecise and for which he later apologized.

The governor outraged Latino activists and his Democratic opponents with his comments, but he was treading an often effective path, analysts said. Republicans have used California's permeable border as political fodder for years. And Schwarzenegger was elected in 2003 after demanding that people in the state illegally not be issued driver's licenses.

Read more.

Warning: just as a wounded animal is a dangerous thing, so is a desperate politician. Pete Wilson was never a popular governor; to remain in power, he never shied from playing the demagogue. Arnold, now desperate, is reading from Wilson's script.

[mitchtv]

1. He's playing "seesaw"

He's now "clarifying" his glowing endorsement of the KKminutemen. These comments had better be all over Spanish tv and radio asap,or the Dems will have lost another opportunity.

[cally]

2. Similar story in SF Chronicle.....I wonder who's idea it was?

I do remember how anti-immigration got Wilson re-elected. I think California is different now and it won't work a second time. Obviously, Repub strategist think it will work. Sigh...

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/05/01/MNG4TCID0B1.DTL


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.
...

[bemildred]

3. Yes, I think this is a recipe for getting his ass kicked.

Which is fine by me. It might well be coming from Pety's
"experts" in the first place, it's their style of thinking, and
I read somewhere they were involved in Ahnulds's campaign in the
recall.