Ex-Univision Co-owner Funding Anti-Immigrant Republican Candidates

Ex-Univision co-owner, Jerry Perenchio, has been reported of being the sixth largest financial contributor to super ‘Public Action Committees’ (PAC) by the Center for Public Integrity  to support Republican Candidates having extreme views on illegal immigrants,.

Although his donations have been finding their way into supporting anti-immigrant candidates,  he hasn’t particularly admitted of being anti-immigrant himself. His contributions to these super PACs amount to at least $2.6 million.

Perenchio, 81 years old, himself belongs to an Italian immigrant family. He has abstained from commenting on his choice of super PACs. Currently he is the Chief Executive of Chartwell Partners, a Los Angeles based boutique investment firm.

Perenchio has contributed handsomely to the Super PACs which support Republican Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney. He is also known to contribute large amounts of donations to the American Crossroads, a pro-Conservative super PAC that has opposed President Barack Obama. The contribution amounts up to a massive figure of $2 million.

Perenchio had bought the Univision network, with his partners, in 1992 for $550 million. After running it for 14 long and successful years, the partnership sold the network for $13.7 billion. The sale made Perenchio a profit of $2.3 million.

From the beginning of the year 2011, till now Perenchio has donated about $2.6 million dollars to super PACs. From this the biggest share of $2 million went to American crossroads. Then came the $500,000 funding to the Restore Our Future, a super PAC that aimed at helping Mitt Romney into the White House and a $100,000 to another super PAC backing up another Presidential Candidate.

Matt Barreto, a political scientist at the University of Washington, said that such donations on the part of Perenchio were rather appalling as the network he co-owned was known to be pro-immigrant.

“Univision has really, for a long time, been extremely open and tae a welcoming position towards immigrants” he said, “Their news has been very pro-immigrant. They have been advocates and that is why they have such a large and loyal audience. And, understand that audience, their ratings, those viewers, are what made it possible for Univision to charge what it does for ad time.”

Former California Republican party political director, Mike Madrid, said that it is not essential to know what Perenchio’s politics are. “The truth is,” he said, “Perenchio is not a party insider. He is not an ideologist. He is a big businessman.”

Now it would be easy to understand the political tendency of Perenchio just by observing the tendency of his donations.

Mitt Romney has made it clear that he is an advocate of the ‘self deportation’, a program that aims at making conditions in the United States so unfavorable for the illegal immigrants that they leave the country voluntarily.

The American crossroads, which received the biggest share of Perenchio’s donations, is a super PAC known to support candidates who have strict immigrant views. The organization is also known for favoring repeal for the Affordable Care Act, which would have extended the medical coverage budget of the Latinos to $9 million.

It wouldn’t be unfair to suggest that the orientation of Perenchio’s donations is one sided and biased. Exclusive support for anti-immigrant Candidates is all that can be deduced from this track record.

Tags: Affordable Care Act, American Crossroads, California Republican party, Chartwell Partners, Immigration, Jerry Perenchio, Mitt Romney, President Barack Obama, Restore Our Future, super Public Action Committees, United States, United States of America, University of Washington, Univision network, US Immigration