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Whitman says she opposes Arizona law
Candidate for governor advocates end to illegal hiring

By John Marelius
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
May 6, 2010 at 11:33 p.m.

Meg Whitman, a Republican candidate for governor, answers questions Thursday while campaigning in the backyard of a home of supporters in University City.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman said in San Diego on Thursday that she opposes Arizona’s controversial anti-illegal-immigration law and would veto such legislation if it were sent to her desk as governor.

“I understand the frustrations that Arizonans have with the abject failure of the federal government to secure the border of the United States,” Whitman said. “However, if such a law came to me as governor of California, I would oppose it. And the reason is I think I have a better plan to solve this most urgent problem.”

She said cracking down on employers who hire illegal immigrants is essential to any solution.

Whitman’s opponent for the Republican nomination, state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, supports the Arizona law that makes it a crime to be in the state without legal status and requires local police to question people suspected of being in the country illegally.

He initially opposed the law, but said at a Sunday debate in San Jose that last-minute revisions aimed at avoiding racial profiling “have taken care of, from my point of view, any concerns.”

Whitman, the former eBay CEO, fielded questions about a wide range of issues after speaking to about 75 people in the backyard of Jackie and Wayne Young, a retired couple in University City.

When asked about the Arizona law by Joe Huston, a neighbor of the Youngs, she said she instead advocates going after employers who knowingly hire people who are in the U.S. illegally and deploying the California National Guard to help patrol the border.

But Whitman said such measures would be of limited effectiveness if the federal government didn’t provide more equipment and manpower.

Jarrod Agen, communications director for Poizner’s campaign, said Whitman’s position sounds like that of Attorney General Jerry Brown, the presumptive Democratic nominee for governor. “She holds the same positions as Jerry Brown on Arizona’s immigration law, and both Whitman and Brown are against across-the-board tax cuts,” Agen said.

Huston, a retired engineer, said later that he was satisfied with Whitman’s answer on immigration even though he disagrees with her. “Although she has a different view than I do, I respect it,” he said.

Huston questioned whether Whitman’s agenda would be stymied by the Democratic Legislature, as he said Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s has been.

“You’ve got the liberal-elitist Legislature saying no to everything you come up with,” he said. “So how could you get through that roadblock when the ‘Terminator’ couldn’t?”

Whitman said she would pursue a focused agenda of cutting state spending, creating jobs and improving education, and would prod the Legislature into cooperating by vetoing all bills that didn’t address those problems.

“I see now, being in politics, there’s a gravitational pull to solve every single person’s problem,” she said. “You can’t do it. You’ve got to focus on a small number of things.”


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Her results with E-bay speak for themselves. She's not an air head. Cannot fathom why she wants to be governor. She may understand the fiscal problems and the solution is obvious but if she tries to implement she will have created a Grecian situation. If I were her, I'd let Gerry Brown handle this one.

Welcome to the Dark Side my friend...

The LA Times has been running a series of endorsement editorials for a panoply of offices at stake in the upcoming primaries. Your posting of the Whitman article reminded me that the Times, today, came out stating that they cannot support any candidate of either party for both the Senate and gubernatorial positions.

For governor and senator: no endorsements - latimes.com