Joe Arpaio Quotes

A ‘liberal paradise’ would be a place where everybody has guaranteed employment, free comprehensive health care, free education, free food, free housing, free clothing, free utilities and only law enforcement personnel have guns. And, believe it or not, such a liberal utopia does indeed exist. ... It’s called prison.

This is the sheriff you’re talking about, with a gun and badge that enforces the law. Nothing is going to stop me from cracking down on illegal immigration as long as the laws are there.

Maybe today you could have shot anybody and get away with it. So there's many times, I could have killed people. Legally, I could have killed many people, especially working undercover.

I'm an equal-opportunity law-enforcement guy - I lock everybody up.

If you come across illegal aliens committing crimes, other crimes, you deport them.

You go to London, you see a TV set in every cell and the sign up that all the officers must treat prisoners with dignity. What about your dedicated soldiers that have helped fight in Afghanistan and Iraq? They're living in tents and our soldiers are living in tents. So it's OK for soldiers to live in tents, in hot tents, but it's wrong for inmates?

I am the constitutionally and legitimately elected sheriff, and I absolutely refuse to surrender my responsibility to the federal government.

We learn by our problems. We correct our deficiencies if there are any.

Everything I did in the jails - chain gangs, everything - I haven't changed the policy. I did it, I stand by it, and I'm not going to change.

If they [mexicans] cross the border, I think, and they are violating the law, then that word criminal does connect with that violation, so if they're violating the law, I guess you can call them criminals. We call everybody else criminals that violate the law.

I just came back from - with Trump when I endorsed him in Iowa, in Marshalltown, a little town - 27,000 - have a lot of Hispanics working there from Mexico in a private business, so they're still here. I'm not saying they're here illegally but they still come and they work, make money for their families, send the money back to Mexico or whatever, so it's a big problem.

I don't use e-mail or u-mail or whatever it's called.

If a nation's security is only as strong as its weakest link, then America may be in serious trouble. Hawaii may be our weakest link and could have a serious impact on our nation's immigration policy.

Some people call me a publicity hound.

I get a lot of calls from families and people who have served time and they say, 'Thank you, Sheriff. I hate the tents.' That's music to my ears.

I don't bow down to the federal government.

I think it doesn't matter what color you are. Everybody is getting the - getting the stick, and I'm sure Trump feels the same way.

When you see a white guy at three in the morning on your beat in an alley, you kind of - "What's this guy doing here?"

The day I leave, you won't know how to pronounce my name. You could care less about me, and I should be dead and buried because there's not one media that will come and remember who Joe Arpaio is. That's the way it is in politics.

I can get along great with the Hispanics. In fact, I sure would like to meet them, even the politicians, maybe in the back room or whatever, have a couple of beers and try to explain. But they need to understand that I enforce the laws. I want to listen to them and hear their problems. I want them to tell me what their problems are.

If you mention what he said about rapists from Mexico, there are some that come over - I can prove that with how many I have in the jail system - but I don't think Donald Trump meant that everybody coming over are rapists. Come on, he knows that and I know that.

I'm not a computer guy. I have my Smith Corona. I would know nothing about computers.

I would hope to get together with the Latino community, if I could ever have them talk to me without screaming and threatening me. So I hope to get together with the community and try to explain what we do, so that's going to be one of my missions coming up.

The young people when I go to McDonald's, the Hispanic clerks will come by, 'Sheriff, can we have a picture?' over and over again. At least they want a picture with me.

I have compassion, I've told you people that over and over again. Enforcing the law overrides my compassion.

I'd rather report to four million people as the elected Sheriff than some governor or president, so I like reporting to the people.

Now everybody is mafia. You got the Russian mafia, the Mexican mafia. Everybody is mafia these days.

I believe Donald Trump is the best guy for president; and I'm not going to shy away and I take the risk. I could just stay home and don't talk about any candidate.

Everything I do in my life is very aggressive.

I just can't surrender. I can't start something and then surrender because of political reasons. I just don't do that, and that goes back to me, why I keep running when I should probably take it easy, even though I have no hobbies, and enjoy the rest of my life.

I used to have trust with reporters. Give them scoops. Those were the old days. It's very strange, when you give a story and it doesn't come out the right way.

I roam the streets all the time. You'll be shocked. I'm shocked, everybody that comes up to me, "Oh, thank you, Sheriff. You're supporting Trump." I don't care who they are. They kind of whisper sometimes.

Look at Israel. Israel is a great country for examples on how to do security.

I think [ immigration] is still is a problem, whether it's 11 million or 2 million. Why is it - why have the situation decreased? Are we going to say because of the crackdown or are we going to say that the jobs are not here?

You know why you have to give [Donald] Trump credit, whether you don't like him or not? He opened the door.Now there's a lot of talk about immigration. That's good. Nobody wanted to talk about it.

I don't care where [Ted] Cruz comes from. I don't care where the President comes from. Day one, I opened an investigation on a fraudulent government Hawaii document, period, on a birth certificate, so if you can say Cruz has fake documents, okay.

Let [Ted] Cruz - let the people go to the courts and see if he's here legitimately. I don't know. I'm not going to get into that.

I still think people like to hear from someone's heart and how they really feel than the old political rhetoric trying to not say the wrong thing because how would it look, would they get votes, lose votes.

We do have freedom of speech, but if you say the wrong word, it looks like it makes headlines. So everybody has to be very careful.

It doesn't matter whether you're black, Hispanic, white. They're all in the same boat.

In the old days when I was enforcing illegal immigration laws, when I had the authority from the 287G, everybody accused me that 100,000 people from foreign countries left town. They either went back to where they came from or whatever. So if this little old sheriff can cause, if you want to believe it, many, many people leaving and going back to their country, why can't you do that nationwide?

I don't look at me taking risks or if that's going to affect me politically.

If I'm hated, okay. I don't believe that.

All the studies say that immigrants are less likely to be criminals in the United States. That's what they say. The sources are there.

There's a lot of other [than Donald Trump] people that say things you may call insulting, but no one seems to care about that.

I don't think Donald Trump is afraid of journalists. If he was, he wouldn't be on the TV every hour on the hour.

Once I can talk to people, I switch them over on my side.

I just talk, and I say what I feel, and yet, I'm a nice guy.

I take risks, if you want to call it a risk. All the people running for president, last time, you know, they all came to visit me or meet me. They all wanted my endorsement and I endorsed [Rick] Perry at that time. He wasn't that well-liked either, but you have to do what you have to do.

I don't rely on the media. I usually average one speech a day for 25 years. People know me because I'm out there.