By Maureen O’Donnell
Chicago Sun-Times
KENDALL COUNTY, Ill. — Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio, the tough-talking lawman who has made pink underwear more famous than Victoria’s Secret, came to Kendall County on Saturday to speak at a GOP fund-raiser, but first the self-described “publicity hound” rode down a hill in a golf cart to meet with protesters who say he’s a civil- and human-rights nightmare.
When Arpaio, 79, got out of the cart and waded into the middle of the demonstrators, the volume went from loud to deafening.
“Go home, Sheriff Joe! This is not Arizona!” chanted about 60 people who said Arpaio engages in racial profiling, persecutes undocumented workers and tramples the civil rights of inmates at his jail in Maricopa County. He often talks about housing prisoners in broiling tents in the desert and boasts about feeding them for about half of what he spends on the guard dogs.
And then there’s the pink underwear: Arpaio forces convicts to wear pink boxers. That cuts down on undie thefts when inmates leave the jail, he says.
“Why [do] you say ‘Go home?’ ” he asked the protesters. “Hold on, I am a U.S. citizen. I can go anywhere in the United States, including Illinois.”
He walked over to about a dozen supporters and shook their hands. The pro-Arpaio group carried Tea Party signs and placards that read “Honk for Deportation.”
One backer, Ryan Strong, 29, Shorewood, who said he’s a staff sergeant with the National Guard, told Arpaio he’d lived in tents in Afghanistan. “If it’s good enough for our troops, you’re damn right, it’s good enough for the inmates,” he said.
The protesters also had signs that read “No County for Old Racists.” Jim Birch, 62, who lives outside Yorkville, said, “Nobody likes illegal immigration, but Sheriff Joe is so way out of line, he’s profiling.”
Saying he couldn’t hear himself speak over the shouts - and repeatedly asking reporters why there weren’t more media outlets there - the man who calls himself “America’s toughest sheriff” then motored back up the hill to speak at the Republican bash.
He was invited by Kendall County Coroner Ken Toftoy, head of the Kendall County GOP. About 475 people bought tickets - ranging from $20 to $500 - to the event at the County Fairgrounds in Yorkville, Toftoy said. About 375 people attended his speech, where those pink undies were for sale for $15 with his signature and the words, “Go Joe!”
In his speech, and also during an interview, Arpaio:
* Said he has been busy conducting raids in which undocumented workers were arrested. “In the last two days, I raided a hotel . . . McDonald’s, a Sizzler, Chinese places - so I can’t eat anywhere anymore. Mexican restaurant, I sure can’t eat there.”
* Corrected himself for saying the tents had reached 140 degrees in the Arizona heat at 2 p.m. Friday, saying, “It’s really only 134 degrees.” Asked about any possible public-health threat, given Chicago’s experience with heat-wave deaths, he said, “I don’t think it’s unhealthy . . . nobody died in a tent.”
* Said the inmates hate the pink underwear, but “I’m sure in San Francisco it would not be a problem.” That drew one of the biggest laughs from the crowd.
* Said he took away coffee, cigarettes and porn from inmates, allowing them to view only the movies “Lassie Come Home,” “Old Yeller” and a Donald Duck film.
* Boasted about introducing “the only woman chain gang in the history of the world.”
Critics often sue him, he said, but “My polls go up every time.”
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