Steve Hilton, a Republican running for the gubernatorial seat in California, put on a master-class for how to avoid allowing leftist media pundits to trap you with a question on the highly controversial topic of mass deportations, during a debate moderated by CNN’s Kaitlan Collins. What gave Hilton the edge when answering the question is his status as the only legal immigrant on the debate stage.
“Mr. Hilton, right now, President Trump is enacting a policy of mass deportation. As you know, roughly half of California farm workers… are undocumented. As governor, would you push to deport them?” Collins asked the California Republican. Hilton immediately turned to his status as a legal immigrant. “So I’m the only legal immigrant on stage.”
“I’m a legal immigrant, and Americans support immigration when it is properly controlled,” Hilton said, going on to discuss what he witnessed with immigration under the Biden administration. “And what we saw under the Biden administration, open borders, undermined everybody’s support for immigration.” He then explained to Collins and the viewing audience what he would do if he were to become California’s next governor.
“And as governor, I’ve made it very clear, although it is the federal government’s responsibility to determine and implement immigration policy, I think it’s important that all the laws are peacefully enforced. And as governor, I would make sure that we work WITH the federal government to enforce our laws,” Hilton said, successfully navigating the minefield Collins tried to trap him in.
According to a report from Al Dia, the debate brought together a total of seven candidates to debate and explain their campaign platforms, five of them Democrats and two Republicans. During the event, Hilton, who is backed by President Donald Trump, sought to expose how Democrats are responsible for the housing crisis, high taxes, and declining quality of life in the Golden State.
Another hot topic of the evening was the homelessness crisis. Currently, California has the largest population of homeless people in the country, which has become a symbol for Democratic policy failure. The Democratic candidates attempted to make the case that the best way to solve the problem was expanding housing and assistance programs.
The Republican candidates opted to take a different approach, looking at solutions that tackled the underlying causes of homelessness such as drug addiction, mental health disorders, and crime. The comments on the video clip of the exchange between Collins and Hilton were a mixed bag. One individual completely agreed with Hilton’s assessment that the Biden administration is responsible for the border crisis.
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“He’s right about one thing, I never cared about the border issue until Biden and the left made it into an issue that had to be addressed!” the user wrote. Another person slammed CNN for using the term “undocumented” to describe illegal aliens. “Here we go again with the lies @cnn saying undocumented. But they are DOCUMENTED. They have a driver’s license, they have EBT cards, they have documents. THEY ARE ILLEGAL! So stop lying to the people!” the person commented.
A third user said, “For decades work visas have been used to bring workers into our country. The workers (and employers) are vetted, they work the season and return to their homeland with their earnings. There is no legitimate reason for people to be brought into our country illegally simply to satisfy lazy/corrupt employers who do not want to go through the legal process/paperwork.”
Featured Image: screenshot from embedded video