0:00.0	Hey everybody, I have a disturbing one today.
0:08.0	You know, as usual.
0:10.0	The subject today is immigration in our southern border and children and families and who we are.
0:20.0	We are, of course, a country of immigrants. Let me tell you how much as a
0:26.1	nation we value immigrants. In the entire history of the United States of America, in our 238 years
0:34.6	as a republic, we have not had a president, a vice president, or a member of the cabinet
0:40.3	who did not descend from immigrants. Until this year, it took till just a few weeks ago when
0:48.3	Dev Holland, a member of the Laguna Pueblo tribe, took her oath as Secretary of the Interior. Must be nice, Deb Holland,
0:58.6	being indigenous. Your forefathers didn't have to go through immigration like mine did. Sweet.
1:06.7	My grandparents were immigrants. My mom's side came from Russia. My dad's from Germany, all about the same time, right, right at the turn of the century, but 1900. They came into New York Harbor, passing the Statue of Liberty with Emma Lazarus's poem on its pedestal. Give me, you're tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.
1:32.9	The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these the homeless, tempest tossed to me.
1:41.0	I lift my lamp beside the golden door. I got to admit, that's a nice welcome. Now, all my
1:49.3	grandparents were Jews, not particularly popular in some circles in this country at the time.
1:56.2	Even now, the guy who wore the Camp Auschwitz shirt at the Capitol at the riot in January,
2:03.1	clearly not a fan. Now, he might be surprised, for example, that Michael Landon, Little Joe on
2:09.0	Bonanza and Charles Ingalls on Will House on the Prairie, Jew. Really? Says the guy in Camp Auschwitz shirt. I like that show. Maybe these Jews aren't so bad
2:24.9	after all. My grandpa, Simon Kunst, who came at the age of 16 from Russia, speaking no English,
2:33.3	built a quilting factory. My grandfather Otto Franken from
2:37.2	Germany drove a truck from Washington Heights on the top of Manhattan to Maine and picked up
2:43.0	lobsters and brought them back down to fancy schmancy restaurants in the theater district.
2:48.2	I never knew Otto. The kids in Washington Heights loved him.
2:53.0	He died of tuberculosis in 1994 at the age of 48. They got on a boat, across the ocean,
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Al Franken Podcast, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The Al Franken Podcast and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.