The Daily Signal - For This Immigrant, the American Dream Came True

Episode Date: May 25, 2021

Humberto Lopez came to this country legally as an immigrant with his family. He joins "The Daily Signal Podcast" to discuss why his family came to America, his initial thoughts about it, and more. "The American dream is still attainable as long as we have capitalism," Lopez says, adding: Big government, it's getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And I think that's going to take away the opportunities for a lot of the dreams [that] a lot of us would have had 50, 60 years ago. It's making it harder and harder. I got a video the other day, it's called 'The Great Reset,' where you won't own anything, but you'll be happy. Well, sure you'd be happy if they give you a home, free education, universal pay, college tuition free, and you stay home and don't do anything. Yeah, you're going to be very happy. But those of us that want to work hard for the American dream, it's going to make it harder and harder. We're going to be working for the government.We also cover these stories: The Biden administration rebukes Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko following the forcing-down of a Ryanair flight and arrest of a dissident journalist in Minsk in what the airline called a “state-sponsored hijacking.” President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris speak out against antisemitism in America.  Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signs a bill aimed at preventing social media companies from "deplatforming" users and fighting online censorship. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Tuesday, May 25th. I'm Doug Blair. And I'm Virginia Allen. On today's show, we share Rachel Del Judas's interview with Humberto Lopez. Lopez immigrated to America from Mexico as a boy. He became an entrepreneur and today runs a large real estate business with over 10,000 apartment units. He's also a Heritage Foundation board member. He joins the podcast to share his story of achieving the American dream.

And don't forget, if you're enjoying this podcast, please be sure to leave a review or a five-star rating on Apple Podcasts and encourage others to subscribe. Now, on to our top news. The Biden administration rebuked Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko, following the forced diversion of Ryanair flight and the arrest of Belarusian dissident journalist Roman Protasevich by alleged KGB agents in Minsk in what the airline called a state-sponsored hijacking. Protasevic was traveling on Ryan Air Flight 4978 from Athens, Greece to Vilnius Lithuania, when air traffic controllers in Belarus ordered the plane to land in the Belarusian capital. Upon arrival, Proto Savage was allegedly arrested by secret service agents who had been aboard the flight, per the hill. In response to the incident, White House Press Secretary Jen Saki called for an international investigation and for accountability from Lukashenko's government.

Here's Saki via Yahoo News. We certainly, since you gave me the opportunity to do this, condemn the Lugoshenko's regime's ongoing harassment and arbitrary detention of journalists simply for doing their job. This was a shocking act, diverting a flight between two EU member states for the apparent purpose of arresting a journalist. It constitutes a brazen affront to international peace and security by the regime. We demand an immediate international, transparent, and credible investigation of this incident. We are in touch with a range of partners bilaterally and through multilateral channels from NATO, the OSCE, UN, EU, and others.

And we have nothing to read out at this point, but we will continue to coordinate closely with them. European leaders also voiced their concerns with the Belarusian government's actions. The government of Lithuania ordered all flights to and from the country to avoid Belarusian airspace, while German foreign minister, Haiko Moss, called for Protosevich's immediate release. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are speaking out against anti-Semitism in America. On Monday morning, Biden tweeted, The recent attacks on the Jewish community are despicable and they must stop. I condemn this hateful behavior at home and abroad.

It's up to all of us to give hate no safe harbor. The surge in anti-Semitic attacks against the Jewish community in the U.S. and around the world is despicable. It must be called out, condemned, and stop. As a country, we must stand united against hate of any kind. The tweets come after an increase in anti-Semitic attacks in America following the Israel-Hamas mini-war. A window was shattered at a synagogue outside Chicago over the weekend. Video footage of the incident reveals two people breaking the window, one with a stick, and another holding a freedom for Palestine sign.

On Thursday, a Jewish man was assaulted in Times Square. Police are also investigating an incident during a dual pro-Israel. Israel pro-Palestinian protest in Times Square last week in which someone threw fireworks. The Jewish Civil Rights Group, known as the Anti-Defamation League, says it is seeing an increase in online and real-world anti-Semitism since the conflict between Israel and Hamas. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill on Monday aimed at preventing social media companies from deplatforming users as well as fighting online censorship. SB 7072, or as DeSantis called it, Florida's big tech bill,

would make it illegal for social networking sites to ban political actors from their platforms. Platforms that did so would incur a fine of $250,000 per day for state candidates and $25,000 per day for local candidates. The bill also allows non-political individuals to sue social media companies for perceived antitrust violations, as well as, per the Washington Examiner, requiring social media companies to alert users a week before a potential ban to give them a chance to adjust their online behavior. Governor DeSantis discussing the bill via Fox News now.

So it's time to step up and ensure that we, the people, especially our everyday Floridians, are guaranteed protection against the Silicon Valley power grab. With the reform we will sign in today, we'll be the first state to hold big tech accountable so that everyday people who use their platforms have an ability to fight that. The new law enters into effect on July 1st. Now stay tuned for Rachel Del Judas'Ut's comment. conversation with Humberto Lopez as they discuss achieving the American dream. Virginia Allen here, I want to tell you all about a great way you can stay in the know on all

the news the Daily Signal covers. Social media. The Daily Signal has an active presence on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. We are constantly posting news stories, clips from interviews, videos, and more across all our social platforms. Follow the Daily Signal on social media so you can get all the latest content from Reels on Instagram to video clips on Facebook and political commentary on Twitter. We're joined on The Daily Signal by Bert Lopez, co-founder and president of HSS Properties and chairman of the board of Paragon Vision Sciences. Bert, it's great to have you with us on the Daily Signal.

Well, thank you. It's a pleasure to be here. Well, you first came to this country as an immigrant. Can you tell us about your story? Well, my father passed away. We're living in Sonona. and he passed away and I was 12 years old. I was the eldest of six.

And pretty much had to go to work at that point to help the family since my father died without a, he was 51 years old. He did not have a will. Constable to my mother didn't know anything about Mexican law. So we came to the states where my grandmother and uncle lived, so we moved in with them. One bathroom, three adults and six children living in a household. If I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't want to change it. That made me who I am today.

We mentioned you came here because your father passed away. What did you think of America when you first got here? Well, you know, I didn't speak English. I got help back the first year. I was living in a border town, so I really didn't know America until I pretty much graduated and left and went to junior college and then to the University of Arizona. And then the first time I left the state was when I was interviewing with the accounting firm. So I'm a CPA by profession.

It was flown to Los Angeles by a number of the accounting firms. So it was the first time I ever got to see anywhere outside of Nogales and Tucson and Douglas, where I went to school. So that's when I started learning about the country. I was pretty busy working, trying to make a living, helping the family, saving to go to college. and didn't know much until I grew up. Well, you had a lot of different jobs as a teenager. Can you tell us about what you learned in those different jobs? Well, I learned that I didn't want to do those jobs the rest of my life.

And consequently, I devoted myself that I was going to, well, first, I was working 40, 44 hours a week when I was in high school. And I don't know how I ever did in homework. Nevertheless, I was a C student, my counselor, advised that I should go to a vocational school and become a carpenter, a plumber, an electrician. And God, I didn't want to do that because that was not the type of work I wanted to do. I did have a good work ethic since I was working from a pretty young age and in high school, as I said, I was working 44, 44 hours a week. So, consequently, I decided to go to junior college and give it a try.

So I enrolled at Cochee's College in Douglas, Arizona. They just opened the year before. and had saved some money, applied for a loan, a federal loan. I got a grant which I had to pay half of it, and the other half was forgiven. I worked at the cafeteria for my meals. And in the afternoon, since I had the good work habit, I'd go to the library all afternoon and would study all afternoon, taking 18 credits. I never took less than 18 credits in all the four years I was in college.

So two years later, I graduated from Cochese College with an associate in arts degree, transferred to the University of Arizona, continued in the same, worked for my meals. We're in library all afternoon and got out in two years with an accounting major. I applied to go, I wanted to be an auditor, a CPA an auditor, where I get a lot experience of different fields. to figure out what I was going to do the rest of my life. So I applied to all the big aid at the time. Got offers from every one of them.

Chose to go with Deloitte. Became a real estate expert within the firm. 1971, one of the controllers, one of the firms I was sought a thing, gave me a book, how to turn $1,000 into a million. I borrowed $1,000 from my uncle. I told him I'm paying back with my income tax refund, which I did. I then went to the gals since I did. No Los Angeles that well.

I bought a lot in O'Gales. For 3,000, six months later, I sold it for $6,000 plus the $1,000 that I had. By the way, the seller carried back $2,000, so I'd give my $1,000 down. They carried back $2,000, six months later. I sold it. So I made a $3,000 profit plus $1,000. I had $4,000. Immediately I bought another lot for $5,000.

Six months later, I sold it for $11,000. That seller also had carried back part of the purchase price. So before I knew it, I was in my way, I had made within a year and a half, I had made $25,000. Then I started, at that point, that was the National Guard, the Army Reserves. I did not want to, I had gone drafted, so immediately I joined the National Guard. and in the weekends once a month we used to meet and I was able to convince five of my friends to each give me $5,000 and I would put in $5,000

we go out and buy an apartment complex which I told them I'll split the profits 50-50 but I'll get my money last so if I make a mistake you get your money and I lose well six months later we sold it for a hundred-thousand-dollar profit and they became my lifelong investors and the rest is history started to making little investments and before I knew it I was making the large ones.

By 1979 I had properties throughout the southwest all the way up to Georgia, sold out, thought I retired in 1980, but they didn't last long. Wow. Well, as an immigrant to this country, what is your perspective on the current immigration crisis we're seeing right now? I think there's got to be a process. There was a process in the 20s when all of your parents were coming to this country, and there was a process, making sure that the people that were coming were people that we want them to be citizens to this country and not open borders that we have today. I'm not in agreement

with the open borders. Fortunately, since my mother was an American citizen, I was born in this country and I was an American citizen even though I grew up in Mexico. Well, there's a lot of talk, especially recently, about whether or not the American dream is still attainable. Based on your own experience, what do you think? Well, the American dream is still attainable in as long as we have capitalism. Big government, it's getting bigger and bigger and bigger, and I think that's going to take away the opportunities for a lot of the dreams of a lot of us would have had 50, 60 years ago.

It's making it harder and harder. So I got a video the other day. It's called The Great Reset where you won't own anything, but you'll be happy. sure you'd be happy. If they give you a home, free education, universal pay, college tuition free, and you stay home and don't do anything else, you're going to be very happy. But those of us that want to work hard for the American dream, it's going to make it harder and harder. We're going to be working for the government. Well, you launched the Center for Opportunity that's in Tucson. Can you tell us about what the Center does? Yes. Several years ago, I visited a homeless shelter in Phoenix,

and it looked like a homeless shelter. But what I liked about is they were providing the services. I can't recall how many services, but they had a wide range of services over the homeless. So the idea is still in me that if I ever had an opportunity, I would open up a homeless shelter, but it would be with dignity and respect, where all the services would be provided under one campus

and also trying to make it a model for the country. Well, about three years later, a hotel became available, a 3-1-room hotel, and I jumped at the opportunity, bought it close to 10 days, all cash, and immediately I had to go out and find out what I call an anchor tenant, somebody that could help me realize a dream that I had for the center. And I interviewed nine different non-profits, came up with gospel-referred, Rescue Mission had been founded here in Tucson in 1953. It's a religious base, Christian base organization and they agreed to take over and help me with my vision. And before, so I immediately

engaged the architects to plan the whole campus and while at the same time, Hospital Rescue Mission was getting the nonprofits who were going to operate within the center. Today we have about 35 nonprofits operating. All the buildings have been completed. We'll be fully operational by hopefully by October and we'll have up to 550, 600 homeless living facility. However, the whole idea here is not to provide housing and meals for these people, but to get them to reintegrate them back into society, give them dignity and get them a job where they can be self-supporting. So far, we've been very successful. Last month, my understanding, we placed 58 homeless in two jobs.

So the program was working very well. You would never, you'd drive by the property, you'd never see that it's a homeless shelter. It is immaculate. There are all new buildings, beautiful property. Hopefully you'll have an opportunity to go visit and see it for yourself. Well, what would your advice be to a young American who wants to be a successful entrepreneur? Well, you know, one of the things that I've learned in all my years of running, H's or properties is that you cannot teach hard work.

If you don't have hard work ethic in you, it's going to be pretty hard to be successful. And I see a lot of these millenniums, a lot of these young kids. They want to make a lot of money, but they don't want to work too hard. I reward hard work more than I do smart. When I was in school, they used to give you, in grade school, they used to give you a grade for effort. I wish I would do that to that. Well, what was behind your decision to get involved in homelessness? Did you know a particular homeless person, or what was the burden on your heart that made you get involved?

Well, I grew up in welfare. I came to his country. I grew up in welfare. I promised my mom, my mother, and she was in line waiting for back in those days. They didn't give you food stamps. You had to go in to the Department of Economic Security, and they would give you the boxes of food. and I remember she was holding her hand and she was so embarrassed because she had grown up in O'Gallas

and people knew her and all of a sudden she comes back and treats some welfare. While we were living in Mexico, we were pretty much a middle-class family. My father was quite successful. So all of a sudden we go from middle income to not having anything. So I had gotten a taste of a little better life

so I always wanted to go back and recover the life I left behind. So I promised my mother one day I would take care of. and I did. Are there any personal stories from the shelter, from your center of people that you've helped that have gone on to do other things? Oh, absolutely. Right now I have, for the last three months, I have one of the graduates of the center

who before he ended up with an addiction and homeless for five years, he was a general contractor. He had an accident, started taking oxycodone, became addicted to oxycodone. pretty soon OxyContin wasn't working and graduated to the heart of drugs and before he knew it he had lost his family, his home ended up homeless for five years and in jail.

So in jailed out, he got to wake up and he decided at that point he was going to get well so he started doing everything possible to make himself better. He then moved on to the Center of Opportunity graduated from Center of Opportunity and a wonderful young gentleman. So

first what I did I helped him with a car he was riding a bike going to work and then he needed a car so and I had an old car that I made it available to him and when he finished the work he was doing at another property I brought him over to my house and a kid my wife says I love to have this kid is my my son-in-law so he's worked up very well very honest very hard working and he's now he's going to be getting his general contractors license again. He's got a number of high recommendations, and so he's on his way to put a better life and getting back where he left off. Wow, thanks for sharing that. Well, as we wrap up, do you have any thoughts on how conservatives can better reach Hispanics?

You know, today it's getting harder and harder with all the entitlements that people are getting. But, you know, that first generation that comes in, any immigrant that comes into this country, they come here to work. However, if you start promising them all these entitlements, you're going to make them lazy, they're not going to work. We own apartments and hotels, and we build them in apartment complexes. We're finding it harder and harder and harder to find skill workers. And the only ones that come in and take those jobs are Hispanics, or the Mexicans.

The first generation, they come to this country, they come to work very hard. They work in the heat, they work long hours. But, you know, if we start promising that we're going to take care of, of them is going to get harder and harder. For instance, here at the hotel, there is Carlton, we cannot get the minimum wage employees. And we're not paying minimum wage, but we cannot get them to come back to work. My understanding right now, if you're unemployed, you're getting $600 a week, which is $15 an hour without any deductions. I would say at a restaurant the other day, they're paying him $1750, offering $1750. They cannot get them to come to work.

because they don't want to work for $2.50 an hour, which is basically, why make a couple hundred dollars more and I have to go to work where I can get $600 a week without working? So when that stops, hopefully they'll come back, but I don't know if that's ever going to happen because these entitlements are growing by the day. The deficit in this country will be $30 trillion before we know it, which is about $100,000 per living sold in this country. how we ever pay back other than three inflation. I see inflation looming. It's right in front of us. And before we know it, we'll have hyperinflation. Well, Bert, thank you for joining us on the Daily Signal.

It's been great having you with us. Thank you. It's been a pleasure. And that'll do it for today's podcast. Thanks for listening to the Daily Signal podcast. You can find the Daily Signal podcast on Google Play, Apple Podcast, Spotify, and Iheart Radio. Please be sure to leave us a review with a five-star rating on Apple Podcast. and encourage others to subscribe.

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