I interviewed Tony Dolz at the Border's Café in Santa Monica, which was appropriate, because it was at the U.S.-Mexico border early last year that Dolz' political aspirations were born. Dolz is running as a Republican for the 41st Assembly District seat being vacated by Fran Pavley. His platform is squarely based on controlling the borders and fighting illegal immigration, but the sentiments behind his political passion don't fit the xenophobic stereotype.
"We're addicted to a source of cheap docile labor that no one respects, but we allow them to clean our undershorts," says Dolz of illegal workers. "As an immigrant and an Hispanic, I can't accept that."
Dolz is a Santa Monica businessman who came to America as a child from Cuba in the 1960s.
"In a time of political upheaval, my parents were moderates," he says. His father was an attorney, and was very interested in seeing Cuba return from a dictatorship to constitutional law. For a time he was the Secretary of Cuba's Social Security Administration. But the "political climate got a little tense," Dolz says, as Castro's opposition leaders began disappearing, and the family emigrated to the United States.
 Republican Tony Dolz is running for Fran Pavley's 41st Assembly District seat. |
Dolz lived for over a dozen years in Scandinavia, working for a Swedish telecommunications company, before returning to California in 1997. He worked six years for the State of California as a Southern California Director of the Center for International Trade Development and Director of the International Business and Technology Center. He and his wife, a (legal) Danish immigrant, currently run several online businesses, selling products ranging from Scandinavian bedding to baby shoes to alternative health products. He sits on the board of directors of two companies–StoneWall Partners, a venture capital company investing in high-tech intellectual properties and Hollywood Mobile, a news and entertainment content provider for portable, mobile and wireless devices. They have two children–a four-and-a-half year old, and a nine-month old baby.
Dolz' concern with border security and illegal immigration began after September 11, 2001, especially after learning that the recommendations of the 9-11 Commission were not being implemented by the Bush Administration.
"They talked tough, but they didn't act," he says. "At the core of the Commission's recommendations was protection of borders and ports of entry. None of these have been acted on in four years."
It's estimated that there are between 12 and 20 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S.–over four percent of the total population.
"The scary thing is the government doesn't know who these people are, where they come from, what their intention is," he says.
Dolz had gotten involved with an organization of 9-11 families, but their pleas for politicians to act on the commission's recommendations were getting nowhere. Dolz had written letters to his representatives, but says he got back nothing better than form letters.
In January 2005, he took more direct action on the issue.
"I heard an interview on the radio with a group of people equally concerned about our open borders, who were going to do a small PR event on a small section of border in Arizona, to stop the crossings there–to demonstrate that with the will to do it, our government can control the borders.
"I just heard about it on the radio and decided to go. I didn't know any of those people until I got there."
Dolz had become one of the original members of the controversial "Minutemen." For 30 days, he and his newfound cohorts endeavored to seal off a 27-mile stretch of border to illegal activities.
"We took turns watching, 24 hours, around the clock, in groups of three to five people. We had very strict guidelines–we could only observe and report, we could take it as prima facie that if they're crossing that fence they're committing a crime and we could call law enforcement.
"The border patrol officers told us–unofficially, because they weren't supposed to be talking to us–that we had stopped the flow of drugs and human trafficking for that 30-day period, almost completely."
Delving into the reality of border politics, Dolz learned that there were some very powerful forces driving illegal activities at the border. Drug trafficking on the U.S./Mexico border is a $140 billion business, he says, with another $10 billion in illegal profits deriving from trafficking in human beings.
"It became evident to me that with that amount of money you're going to be able to corrupt our government and law enforcement," he says. "They're not working for us anymore, they're working for criminal elements.
"Most people say, ‘Oh, Mexico is so corrupt,' but we're no different. I want to believe in my elected officials, but I don't. I think they're all corrupt."
As the days and nights passed, Dolz says, these volunteer border guards bonded, and discussed further ways to change their country's policy toward illegal immigration. Running for office was one of the ways, and Dolz returned to Santa Monica with a new goal in life.
"In his State of the Union address, Bush said we're at risk because of our addiction to foreign oil. My thinking is that we have another kind of addiction," Dolz argues, "We're addicted to cheap labor. For the last 20 or 25 years there's been a massive invasion of desperate, docile, illegal workers who are vulnerable to poor treatment, low pay and sexual exploitation."
The real criminals, Dolz maintains, are the unethical employers who exploit these desperate workers to evade the respectable labor standards other workers have come to expect.
"It puts out of business ethical employers who pay a living wage and provide health care and benefits," he points out.
He disagrees with the contention that removing cheap labor provided by illegal immigrants would create havoc in the economy. "America turned a blind eye to the exploitation of desperate workers once before in its history when 10 percent of its population was slaves," wrote Dolz in an article for American Chronicle. "Many free citizens before the Civil War would have picked cotton for a fair free-market wage, but not for a slave's wage. Before the Civil War, slave owners argued that without slavery, agriculture in the South would collapse. Following emancipation they were proven wrong. In a free marketplace the price of all commodities, including labor, rise and fall under the influence of demand and supply until it reaches a fair and natural equilibrium. This is what we can call a ‘fair wage.'"
Nor does Dolz buy the argument that consumers benefits from this supply of cheap labor.
"Cheap labor, when it involves illegal immigrants, isn't really cheap. The consumer gets charged in two ways–once at the cash register and once in the tax return. Slimy employers have shifted their costs to the taxpayers."
Dolz says that the estimated costs from illegal immigrants to the taxpayers in California is $10.5 billion a year, or $1,183 per household. These costs are felt in the areas of most concern to California voters–education, health care and the environment.
It costs $7,000 a year to educate a child in California, far more than the vast majority of illegal immigrants earning minimum wage could pay in taxes.
Without health insurance or worker's compensation, most undocumented workers go to emergency rooms for routine care. Many hospitals have closed down and more are threatened because of unrecoverable emergency room payments.
"It makes health care costs higher and inferior because of overcrowded conditions," Dolz argues.
The environment and water supply are impacted by uncontrollable overpopulation.
Of course, the real question is how to deal with the problems caused by U.S. immigration policies and out-of-control illegal immigration.
"I'm opposed to putting a lot of resources into involuntary departures (i.e. deportations)," Dolz says, preferring toughening laws and enforcement to produce gradual voluntary departures. His prescription for "reversing the addiction," is:
•Force employers to check workers' immigration status and put heavy penalties on unethical employers who hire illegals.
•Put limitations on foreign remittance–money sent back to foreign countries by immigrant workers,
•Make it more difficult to get tax-paid benefits if you're not here legally.
Amnesty and guest worker programs are not on Dolz' agenda. "Amnesties doesn't work. They increase illegal immigration." He asserts the 1986 amnesty didn't work."
Having lived in Europe, he has a first-hand opinion of guest worker programs.
"Guest workers never go home –it's impossible to enforce the law, and there isn't the will. In European countries that allow guest workers they end up with oversupplies of labor and record unemployment.
"The whole thing is a lie so that unethical employers don't lose a single day of their cheap labor supply."
Bringing it home to Topanga, I asked Dolz what he thought of the prospect of funding a hiring site for day laborers in the Canyon. His answer was an unequivocal "no."
"Our elected officials swear they will abide by the laws and constitution of our states. If they use taxpayer money, knowingly, for a group of people who are breaking the law every day, they're breaking that pledge. If those illegal workers are in the streets soliciting work and crooked employers are hiring them, they're both breaking the law.
"This is so much corruption that it makes me sick, as an immigrant and as an Hispanic. I don't want this country to create a second class of citizens to create the impression that Hispanics are ‘less than.' So no, I am not going to stand for people who will aid and abet illegal activity.
"Hire Americans, pay a living wage, pay workmen's comp," he urges, "so if someone is injured it's your responsibility as an employer not to pass it on to the taxpayer, like a crook.
"It's very anti-immigrant and racist to think you can do this to workers."
Although registered Democrats outnumber Republicans by eight percent in the 41st District, Dolz believes the immigration issue can be a winner for him. Security concerns cross party lines, he says.
"None of my competitors has this passion and knowledge that I do. None of them are addressing this issue, which is a burning issue in the 2006 election.
"I would like to be the poster boy for reducing California's deficit and improving health care, education and environmental protections–using that $10.5 billion."
I warned Dolz that Topanga is unlikely to go Republican any time soon, but he's eager to come to the community and communicate his message to receptive Canyonites. He invites anyone interested in hosting a Topanga home event for him to contact him at tony@dolz.com. To learn more about his campaign, visit www.dolz.com.
