On the October 16 edition of MSNBC's Tucker, radio host Mark Williams baselessly asserted that immigrants “by and large, the illegal immigrants mainly” are “just here to rip off a piece and to get back to where they come from” and added that they are “drug runners, human traffickers” and “people who engage in slavery and prostitution.” Host Tucker Carlson said, “I agree with that.” Williams later appeared to claim that U.S. possession of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICMBs) would force Spanish-speaking immigrants to learn English, declaring: “As long as we have the ICBMs, they can learn English.”
Williams also spoke of “the rise of this Aztlán movement,” calling it “a heavily armed separatist organization.” As Media Matters for America has repeatedly noted (including here, here, here, and here), “Aztlán” is derived from El Plan Espiritual de Aztlán, the founding document of the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán (Chicano Student Movement of Aztlán, or MEChA), a group with affiliates at numerous college campuses and several high schools that claims to work toward “improving the social and political situation of the Chicano/Latino community.” Aztlán and “reconquista” are concepts promoted by “white supremacists and neo-Nazis” more than by Mexicans or Mexican-Americans, according to a March 30 column by Alex Koppelman, a columnist for Drexel University's biweekly online magazine, Dragonfire.
As Media Matters noted, Williams also asserted on the September 26 edition of Tucker that “people have made up their minds ... that if we vote Democrat, that just hastens the day we disappear in a nuclear holocaust.”
From the October 16 edition of MSNBC's Tucker:
CARLSON: There are about ten and a half million illegal aliens living in this country right now. That number goes up every single year. The rate of immigration, legal and illegal, into this country is at its highest levels in the history of the country. So this idea that “Oh, you know, we've always had this trickle of immigration in our country, this is who we are” -- it's a lie. Things are changing faster now than in history, and I'm wondering, Mark, if this isn't yet another sign that our country is becoming a very different country, even as we watch.
WILLIAMS: Yeah, that trickle has become a tsunami, and it's not a tsunami that is here to become Americans or to assimilate and contribute the best of their culture and add it to what we've got here. We're talking about a group by and large, the illegal immigrants mainly, who are just here to rip off a piece and take it back to wherever they came from. We're talking about drug runners, human traffickers. We're talking about people who engage in slavery and prostitution. We're talking about, yeah, the occasional honest agriculture worker. But by and large, we're not talking about people who are coming here to become American. That's why, in southern California, we're seeing the rise of this Aztlán movement, which is a heavily armed separatist organization, movement, which allies itself with the Palestinian Liberation Organization, of all groups. They see themselves as the North American Palestinians. We're dealing with a cultural rift here that, unlike past waves of immigration, doesn't wish to be assimilated and absorbed, much less will work with us toward making it one country. I mean --
CARLSON: I agree. I agree with that.
WILLIAMS: Here in California, I'm having to learn how to speak Spanish to deal with my own neighborhood.
CARLSON: You and many others. Sam, I want you to sum it up here. Why is it that the environmental industry, environmental groups, the permanent environmental class of activists in this country hasn't said anything that I've heard about the 300 millionth American. What about overpopulation? Weren't liberals really afraid of that 20 years ago? Are we no longer afraid of [economist Thomas] Malthus's theories?
GREENFIELD: Well, the only -- I haven't heard that liberals are afraid of procreation. Last time I checked, we're not. And Tucker, you've added three kids to the population.
CARLSON: Four.
SAM GREENFIELD (New York radio talk-show host): Four? God, I turn my back and -- you know, holy cow, literally.
CARLSON: Check in next week.
GREENFIELD: It's now. No, but what I'm saying is this, you know, a lot of these people do come to this country to be Americans, and they do come to this country to earn a living. They come to this country because they are poor. But I do agree that illegal immigration is a serious, serious problem. And I have no idea how to address it. I'm not going to lie, I have no idea. As far as Mark learning another language, you know, we're the only country on this planet where people don't know one or two -- two or three languages. So what I say to you is, “Buenos tardes, que lástima es mi amigo.”
WILLIAMS: And I say, so long as we have the ICBMs --
CARLSON: I don't know. I don't know if that qualifies as knowing another language.
GREENFIELD: -- grande a ya donde. By the way, what I just said is “Geraldo Rivera is slap happy.” In Spanish.
WILLIAMS: As long as we have the ICBMs, they can learn English.