GOP Gubernatorial Debate: Quien es Más Macho on Immigration?

It sounds like we returned last night to 1994 in California last night, at least for a brief moment.  The SF Chronicle reports thatGOP gubernatorial candidates Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner clashed face-to-face Monday in their first debate and sparred on, among other things, immigration.

“Poizner, continuing a potentially risky strategy in recent days, repeated his calls for a return to the approach to immigration in Proposition 187, passed by voters in 1994, which called for denying undocumented immigrants, including children, the right to state-funded services such as education and health care. A federal court later struck down the measure. . . . [He stated:] `. . . I support Prop. 187; she opposes it.’ Whitman declared herself `100 percent against amnesty, no exceptions,’ saying, `We haven’t done what we need to do to secure this border.'” 

I hope that the two candidates remember what happened to former California Governor Pete Wilson, who won the battle (re-election) but lost the war (he now lives in unofficial political exile) in no small part due to his exuberant explotation of anti-immigrant fervor in supporting Proposition 187 in 1994.

KJ