Former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger spoke out forcefully Monday in opposition to the partisan effort to redraw California’s congressional districts that voters will resolve in a November particular election.
“They are trying to fight for democracy by getting rid of the democratic principles of California,” Schwarzenegger advised hundred of scholars at an occasion celebrating democracy on the College of Southern California. “It is insane to let that happen.
The Hollywood action star turn Republican governor urged the students to vote against the redistricting measure, Proposition 50.
Schwarzenegger has long championed political reform. During his final year as governor, he prioritized the ballot measure that created independent congressional redistricting. Four former members of the independent commission were recognized by Schwarzenegger at the event, and he had lunch with them and members of the university’s student governmentafterward.
He said he grew interested in the esoteric process of redistricting when he was governor and realized that districts drawn by politicians protected their political interests instead of voters.
“They want to dismantle this independent commission. They want to get rid of it under the auspices of we have to fight Trump,” Schwarzenegger mentioned. “It doesn’t make any sense to me because we have to fight Trump, [yet] we become Trump.”
Since leaving workplace, Schwarzenegger has prioritized good governance at his institute at USC and campaigned for impartial redistricting throughout the nation. The governor’s remarks had been being recorded by the anti-Proposition 50 marketing campaign in what might simply be became a tv advert.
Exterior, scholar Democrats handed out fliers in assist of Proposition 50.
The occasion, a dialogue with USC Interim President Beong-Soo Kim marking the Worldwide Day of Democracy, was scheduled to happen earlier than conservative activist Charlie Kirk was fatally shot final week whereas talking at a Utah school campus.
Schwarzenegger mirrored on Kirk’s loss of life as he warned concerning the fragile state of democracy.
“That someone’s life was taken because they had a different opinion, I mean it’s just unbelievable,” Schwarzenegger mentioned, noting that Kirk was a talented communicator who related with younger folks, even those that disagreed with him. “A human life is gone. He was a great father, a great husband, and I was thinking about his children — they will only be reading about him now instead of him reading to them bedtime stories.”
He warned that the nation’s political local weather was spiraling.
“We are getting hit from so many angles and we have to be very careful we don’t get closer to the cliff. When you fall down there, there is no democracy,” Schwarzenegger mentioned, blaming social media, the mainstream media and the political events for dividing People. “It’s very important that we turn this around.”
He urged the a whole bunch of scholars who attended the occasion to indicate that folks can disagree politically with out demonizing each other.
