After deciding that USC would celebrate the International Day of Democracy for the first time, interim President Beong-Soo Kim was looking for a keynote speaker.

“I was walking by Tommy Trojan,” Kim said. “And I thought, ‘Gosh, wouldn’t it be cool if the [speaker] somehow resembled Tommy Trojan? Someone who would cause the registration system for this event to crash… the first minute that reservations were up? Nah. We’re never gonna find someone like that.’”

On Monday, Kim and former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger spoke to a crowd of students for the 18th United Nations International Day of Democracy. They spoke about the political chasm,  Schwarzenegger’s mindset on failure and the current redistricting efforts in California at Town and Gown. 

A deepening political divide

Kim asked about Schwarzenegger’s reaction to the assassination of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University. Schwarzenegger called Kirk a “great communicator” and a “great advocate to the right and Republican causes.” 

“He had such a great way of communicating with students, whether they believed or disagreed with him,” Schwarzenegger said. “A human life is gone. And he was a great father, a great husband. I’ve been thinking about his children; they will only be reading about him now, instead of him reading bedtime stories to them.”

Schwarzenegger said there’s been “endless debates” about how to stop this violence, and that the cause of the problem was the division incited by social media companies, mainstream media and political parties.

“We have to be careful that we don’t get closer to that cliff,” Schwarzenegger said. “Because when you fall down that cliff, down there, there’s no democracy.”

Kim asked Schwarzenegger about his turn to political life, which Schwarzenegger attributed to his love for altruism. He said he was elected on the back of “people power,” and that he was attacked by the left for being too far right and by the right for being too far left. 

“I’m not a party servant,” Schwarzenegger said. “I’m a people servant, a public servant. I don’t want to serve the oil companies, the crazy left, the crazy right, nobody. I want to serve the people. I could see when I was sitting as governor, how we couldn’t get things done because of the way the districts were drawn.”

Redistricting and democracy

Another topic brought up was Newsom’s redistricting plans; Proposition 50 would require new district maps to be drawn in California, helping Democrats gain seats in the House of Representatives. These seats would be proportional to Texas’s own gerrymander, requested by President Donald Trump to give Republicans a House majority in the 2026 Midterm Elections. 

Schwarzenegger said that politicians and people were only further polarized by how districts were drawn. He said the only way around this was an independent redistricting commission. During his time as governor, California created an independent redistricting commission, which Schwarzenegger said was met with fierce resistance from Democrats and Republicans. 

Regarding Newsom’s current redistricting efforts, Schwarzenegger said it didn’t make any sense to become Trump when fighting Trump.

“Two bad behaviors don’t make a right behavior,” Schwarzenegger said. “It doesn’t make any sense to me at all to go back on our principles, and the map that they’ve drawn and put in front of the public was once again drawn by the politicians. Drawn by the politicians!”

He asked members of the California Citizens Redistricting Commission in the front row to stand, and they were met with applause from the crowd. He asked them if they had been involved in the redistricting process to be presented in November, and they answered that they had not. 

“The most important thing in democracy is transparency,” Schwarzenegger said. “Remember that if you vote yes on [Proposition 50], you’re going backwards. If you shoot a commercial, you’d have all of those guys in Sacramento walk backwards and do everything backwards, because that’s what they want to do, is take us backwards. And we’re not going backwards.”

One student asked why California redistricting mattered in the face of inaction from Congress, Supreme Court decisions and deployment of the National Guard. Schwarzenegger said he believed there’s no purpose to redistricting apart from weakening democracy in California. 

“The Constitution does not start with politicians,” Schwarzenegger said. “It started, ‘We the People.’ And I think that’s what’s important here. You think it has nothing to do with the federal government. And it doesn’t; it has to do with excuses. You have to understand, they used excuses. For 200 years, all kinds of excuses.”

Proposition 50, the ballot measure that initiates California’s redistricting, is up for a special election Nov. 4. 

“I lost … I’m back.”

Kim asked Schwarzenegger about his time as a bodybuilder and the ways in which America failed or exceeded his expectations. Schwarzenegger got his first impressions of the United States in classroom films as a young boy, inspired by the highrises, Golden Gate Bridge and Hollywood. 

“I saw all of this, and I said, ‘What am I doing in Austria? I should be over there,’” Schwarzenegger said. “I had to figure out how.”

Schwarzenegger said he decided to go into bodybuilding, as that was an “American sport,” and with world championships, he would earn global attention.

The first time he heard about democracy was competing in the Bodybuilding World Championship in East Berlin in 1966. He said one of the weightlifters had asked him what democracy was like, and he couldn’t answer, as he didn’t know the difference. Later, he looked out over the wall and saw the difference: grey, decrepit buildings on the East side, and modern, colorful buildings on the West side. 

“It made me very proud of Austria,” Schwarzenegger said. “Because that was part of the German regime, and the evil, evil dictatorship, and afterwards, they realized ‘This is wrong,’ and formed a democracy. Now this democracy is working like a jewel; Austria has become a great country because of that.”

Kim asked Schwarzenegger to speak on his mindset toward failure and setbacks in light of his eclectic career. Schwarzenegger said the most important thing is having a clear vision of where you want to go. 

“I went to the gym, and I remember the majority of guys always said, ‘Ugh, I have to do another 500 sit-ups,’” said Schwarzenegger. “I never had that attitude, because my vision was ‘Mr. Universe.’ I saw myself with that trophy in hand and a flex of the bicep. And I said, ‘Every rep I do takes me one step closer to making that vision a reality.’ So I couldn’t wait! I was excited for every rep!”

He recounted the story of when he first came to America for a bodybuilding competition. In a strange place with little grasp of the language, he had come in second. “I lost,” he said. He cried all night, woke up the next morning, and said, “I’m back.”