rss
mobile
Feeds
Welch made the comment in a radio advertisement that recently aired on a dozen Savannah stations. In the ad, he derided foreign cars and the Americans buying them.
Welch owns Ford and Lincoln-Mercury dealerships in Bluffton, Hardeeville and Savannah. He formerly owned a dealership in Beaufort.
"On them Japanese cars, even when they're brand new, how come they don't smell like a new car?" Welch asks in his ad. "All those cars are rice-ready, they're not road-ready. When you gonna wake up?" JACL Executive Director Floyd Mori told The Beaufort Gazette that the organization's staff planned to meet to consider demanding an apology from Welch, holding a protest at one of his dealerships or staging another type of response. The closest JACL chapter is in Atlanta.
"We'll look at all options," Mori said. "It seems to me that Mr. Welch would be better off taking a more positive mode rather than trying to use negative stereotypes and bring up emotion from hate."
In an interview Tuesday with The Associated Press, Welch said he made the ad not only to drum up business, but to express anger about auto industry bailout talks in Washington.
"Those ads ran a week ago," he told The Beaufort Gazette in a phone interview Thursday. "It's old news to me."
Welch declined further comment and hung up.
In the ad, Welch said he wants bailout money to go to consumers to help them buy cars and other items, not to automakers.
The U.S. House of Representatives passed a $14 billion aid package Wednesday that died in the Senate on Thursday night. Officials from General Motors and Chrysler said they have a more urgent need for the money than Ford.
"A politician is good for two things: slinging mud and spending our tax dollars," Welch said in the ad. "They're looking at Ford and General Motors and Chrysler to turn the economy around that they ran in the ground."
He also told the Associated Press he sold 15 cars Saturday, the day the ads first aired.
Welch's ad gained national attention. The Associated Press article was published by newspapers and magazines around the country and a television report by WTOC in Savannah was posted on YouTube and picked up by CNN.
Bloggers also latched on to the story. Some said Welch is a patriot; others insisted he's a racist.
Mori said he worries the attention Welch is getting will encourage others to discriminate against Asians.
"Asian-Americans have been the brunt of a lot of ridicule and name-calling and things like this," he said. "When somebody publicly begins to deride a particular ethnic background, often mob mentality takes over."
