Is blunt. The California Republican party has a problem. I think people who have been running in the state have been on a very small message. And im going to say an angry message. Reporter and a message that california voters have largely rejected. Arnold schwarzenegger was one of the only republicans to avoid that fight. His 2006 reelection was the last time the gop won a statewide race. Over the past two decades no issue has played a larger role in the partys struggles than illegal immigration. Im suing to force the federal government to control the border and im working to deny state services to illegal immigrants. Reporter those problems began in 1994 when republican governor pete wilson led the fight for proposition 187, a Ballot Initiative banning Government Services for illegal immigrants. The federal government wont stop them at the border. Yet requires us to pay billions to take care of them. Reporter that battle has damaged the gops reputation with california latinos, now 50 Million People, some 40 of the states population. Challenges for the California Republican party really are ones of numbers. They are right now only about 28 of the overall california electorate. Were beyond the worry stage of the party in california. Were going to have to redefine ourselves. Reporter mike madrid is a latino Republican Campaign strat jips who has been charting both the partys decline and changes in california. Were becoming a younger, poorer, browner, latino state and nation. Young, poor and brown are three characteristics that republicans have never done well with. Reporter which is why madrid says the president ial campaign threatens to push more voters towards voting for democrats. Not just now but for years to come. I will build a great, great wall on our southern border and i will have mexico pay for that wall. Reporter Donald Trumps endorsement of mass deportations may be the reason republican president ial candidates spent the entire summer talking tough on illegal immigration. Some California Republican leaders say trumps rhetoric in particular is politically tough. Ive been in politics a honk time. One of the things ive learned is in politics, friends come and go but enemies chaaccumulate. Hes accumulating enemies. Reporter enemies that could further shrink the power of the California Republican party which is why last weekends convention saw the emergence of a different agenda. First the state party rewrote its platform on illegal immigration. Longstanding references to illegal aliens and to cutting government benefits for undocumented immigrants, those were taken out. Added into the platform, the idea that California Republicans have diverse views on illegal immigration. Others in the party simply want to change the subject. The one president ial candidate who showed up at the state convention says republicans are missing opportunities to talk to voters about a lot of issues. Its frustrating, quite frankly, to be a candidate for president. Youre out there talking about issues that i think matter to every american. Like where are the jobs . Reporter hes not the only one. Now looking forward i care about jobs and the economy. Those are the issues i think are most important to myself and to the rest of the country. I think republicans have to be better at getting their message out. And making it more personal. Telling stories. Not just being logical, rational. Reporter strategist mike madrid says when California Republicans focus on what have become almost unwinnable statewide campaigns they lose. When they focus on local races, races that are mostly nonpartisan, they can win. When you dont have a republican or a democrat in front of the name, and you take out the social issues and the brand, republicans win on core issues of things like government accountability, government transparency, law enforcement, the bread and butter issues that unite the party are still winning issues even in the deepest blue state of california. Are you going to support me . Reporter that strategy though wont help the partys candidates for u. S. Senate in 2016. At least four potential candidates for that race were working the hallways and podiums of the state convention. Their fate largely rests on the overall perception of what it means to be a republican. For kqed newsroom, im john meyers. Indias Prime Minister modi is visiting Silicon Valley this weekend. The bay area is home to one of the largest indianamerican populations in the United States. During his visit, modi will meet with tech executives and attend a reception at s. A. P. Center in san jose. While hes treated like a rock star in some corners, modi attracts critics who question his agenda. Joining me now to discuss this visit are thomas blom hansen, director of Stanford Center for south asia. Sunika is a reporter for india west, a weekly newspaper. M. R. Rankaswami, founder of a nonprofit working to improve u. S. indian relations. Welcome to you all. Your group is one of several hundred helps to organize the event at s. A. P. Center. Tell us why this visit is so important to members of your group . First of all, just a quick backdrop. Thanks for having us here. We are now 3 million strong in the United States. 1 of the population. And the communitys growing and maturing. And during this time frame weve not really had an opportunity to feel very proud of our country. I think for the past decade or so. I think when Prime Minister modi got elected, he brought the sense of excitement and pride in our community, and thats what you see reflected here as hes coming, the excitement is palpable. And quite a few indianamericans here participated in modis election campaign. That takes an incredible level of commitment. What is it about modi that has people so excited . I think his agenda is very ambitious. The sense of innovation that is so crucial to the valley here excited many people. Many went back to india to work on his campaign, about 5,000 people from california went back to india to work on his campaign. What is he hoping to accomplish on this visit to the bay area . I think hes hoping to look at Tech Companies here and what they can bring back to what he can bring back to india in terms of innovation and how india and the u. S. Can collaborate on his ambitious agenda. Including something called the Digital India initiative. Tell us about that. I think this is a very Bold Initiative in india, to transform the country. I think it could be his signature item, if you will. Because india has 900 million cell phones. But it doesnt have connectivity. And 250 million of those cell phones are going to be smartphones. So looking ahead, if you can lay a Fiber Network across india to the villages and the cities and the towns, then i think it will unleash a whole bunch of entrepreneurship and innovation and disruption across the country. It will also bring egovernance and transparency. Its a very Bold Initiative, much like 20 years ago india decided to open up the market for cell phones which made india leap frog from land lines to cell phones. Its certainly ambitious but its also attracting criticism, some concerns. I wanted to bring you in, youre one of more than 130 academics from around the country who signed an open letter criticizing and raising concerns about the Digital India initiative. What are your worries . Three things i think that animate that letter. One is that we, like many other people also in india, are worried about the fact that there is no proper Legal Framework for protecting privacy and handling of large data sets and large masses of data that will be generated. I should say that i think most of us completely share the excitement about this. The potential of this project. It comes in the wake of another very ambitious project which is to have biometric allocation of millions and millions of indian citizens, so on. So its not that we do not support Digital India. Were worried about the lack of protection of privacy. The second thing we are worried about is that we find that this government has so far not had a fantastic good record on handling and respecting sort of the playbook of democracy. Partly because it comes out mr. Modi and his party comes out of a movement, hindu nationalist movement, that at its core is a nondemocratic movement, that is not adhering to or celebrating the principles of liberal democracy that india is so proud of, rightly, the only major democracy in the world that has a long history outside the west. So our worry is modi was denies a visa. He was for nine years, thats correct. And good reasons for that. Because at the time, there were all kinds of questions about his role in the major pogrom that happened in 2002. He was the chief minister. Theres still some cases working their way through the courts. And the question of his complicity in this or not is still the jury is still out on that. This is a case where there was religious rioting, more than 1,000 muslims killed, there are questions yes about why he did not seem to intervene to stop it. Correct. Also in the legal aftermath of the riots, dozens of people have been convicted. They are all associated with his political movement. Many of them are members of the bjp. So the question of him having no knowledge or no complicity, no involvement, is something that people are still debating. I for one do not think that that is a thing thats the last word is not being said in that case yet. Hang on a second, okay . He has never been convicted. And indias a democracy. So i dont think you can not issue someone a visa when hes not even convicted. I take offense to that. And i dont think thats really the case. I mean, you have to wait, theres due process. Correct. Hes been vindicated so far. So theres no reason. And its in the past. Now its in the future. Were now here today. And i think modi has forgiven the whole incident on his side. He could have taken afront and said, im not going to visit the United States. The first thing he did was he got a call from president obama, he returned it, he tweeted about it. Hes become great friends with the u. S. So i think weve got to look at the present and stop looking at the past. How this is playing out in the community . I know that some sikh groups, you are saying that we need to move forward but there are some sikh groups that are very upset. They have threatened to protest while hes here. And also Mark Zuckerberg of facebook has invited him to speak. I was just going through the responses on facebook about that. Many, many people upset that hes coming and are still upset about what happened. Shull. So there are a number of groups that are planning to come out and protest at the s. A. P. Center and also at facebook when hes there. There is an organization that hopes that mr. Modi will address lesbian, gay, bisexual issues in the country. The Supreme Court last year struck down a rule that would have recriminalized homosexuality. And so once again, homosexuality is a criminal act. There are groups that are hoping mr. Modi will address that question while hes here. Also the sir ewe of sikhs. There is a group of sikhs, we put out a 10,000 bounty, if you will, to the first person who will ask him about addressing the civil rights of sikhs in india. Thomas, to what extent are these concerns, the privacy concerns youve raised, the hindu nationalism agenda, to what extend are these concerns an issue to the u. S. In its dealings with india . It should be for the u. S. Government. Certainly it should be a concern for the companies that are hoping to operate and i hope will operate in india on a large scale, that if you want to do that and have a credible operation, one should also make sure that one operates in an environment that has some protection, both in the companies as well as the individuals. Indias famous for its capacity to jen race protest about virtually anything. I think if i was a tech Company Planning to go to india, i would make sure that i wouldnt get create a whole lot of trouble because i didnt do my homework. What we are saying is pale, in the absence of this kind of legal protection, you have to then look at which is the government and what are the people in power who will then be their guarantors of this being done in a way that is in keeping with indias democratic tradition . That is our question. Is this government actually willing and able to do that . Were not sure we want to have the conversation. Thats why we wrote the letter. I take a different perspective on this. We are entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley. We invest in countries. It would be hard to kind of take one stand on india when even in the u. S. Theres been privacy issues. And all the same companies have had all kinds of issues here. So i dont think saying we wont go to india or india should do this, i think the Digital India strategy is very new. I think i welcome this conversation. And it will come. The rights will come. It should. I dont think we should be concerned about investing in india. I think facebook has hundreds of millions of users, so does twitter. Mr. Modi himself has hundreds of millions of fans. So i dont think thats an issue. I think it will come. I dont think the entrepreneurs here that i know of in our community are hesitant to invest in india at all. In fact, i think Venture Capital investment and Angel Investment from Silicon Valley this year will double in india. Im sorry, go ahead. I just in last weeks economist, india was rated 142 out of 189 countries as the place to that was least friendly to business interests. And i wonder how you would respond to that. I accept that. I think its a hard place to do business. But i think what the Prime Minister has done in conjunction with the world bank, hes doing a state to state comparison. I think that will motivate all these different states to compete. I think in a year or two youll see a dramatic improvement in the ease of doing business. Im not condoning any of this. All im saying is we are impatient but also were excited. I want to put it in that framing as opposed to just being impatient. Can i jump in . Go ahead. I want to say in response to the concerns about privacy in the u. S. And any other places, i agree with you. But as much as people hear discussing the nsas role, privacy, so on, we should also welcome discussion in india. We have been quite surprised by the vehemence, the criticism of the letter. We point out this government and particular party in movement, in power now, has a problem with accepting criticism, with accepting playing by normal democratic rules. For us it confirms that that is a worry. And im very happy we wrote that letter because it has generated the beginning of a debate that i hope will carry on for a long time. Generated a lot of conversation. I wanted to ask you about something else. According to a stanford study, indianamericans have founded more Technology Companies in this country than any other immigrant group. And modi has made it clear he wants to encourage these entrepreneurs to come back to india and help india. What are some of the factors entrepreneurs are weighing before they come back . Because as sunita pointed out, theres the tax code, the infrastructure is underdeveloped, and Internet Service is patchy. So i think a couple of things. I think theres certain tax rules he has to change, which is quickly starting a company and quickly being able to close a company. So those are things that are being worked on. But they need to do that. On the other hand, though, starting a tech company in india, you dont need as many permits and regulations as starting a manufacturing company. So i think theres still a thriving ecosystem in india. I host an event in india, last year we had 1,000 startups compared to five years ago only a couple hundred. I think the community is growing and its quite strong. I think from that point of view were okay, we just need to change rules. I wanted to add a comment to that. Ive seen increasingly that companies here, Tech Companies here, are interested in the bottom of the pyramid. Addressing the market thats at the bottom of the pyramid. Last week i did a story about dwight fuller energy which is selling goose lamps to Indian Students so that they can study at night because theres not a consistent source of energy to about 400 Million People in india. Providing these students with these lamps significantly increases their capacity to learn. There is another fellow out here who has developed a small implement to put under a cook stove so that the efficiency of heat is concentrated. So im excited that the bottom of the pyramid is being addressed by bay area entrepreneurs. And it looks like you wanted to Say Something . No, i wanted to add that i think a lot of the excitement about Digital India project in terms of generating jobs, in terms of generating connectivity, could actually reach a much wider part of the indian population. Because that is a problem in the Indian Economic miracle, as it were. It has not been generating jobs. It has not touched millions and millions of peoples lives at all. Its been very good for about five to ten, 15, 20 of the population. But the rest of them have not actually benefited in any major way. So i welcome a lot of these initiatives. I do think that most of the fundamentals still have to be addressed in terms of infrastructure, in terms of basic education, so on, so forth. I see i dont really see modi moving on that. He moves on some of these hightech sectors and thats good. But thats only a very small part of the overall picture. Well, hes the first to visit in more than 30 years here in the bay area. So certainly generating a lot of talk, a lot of excitement, a lot of conversation, and a lot of healthy debate, we hope. Exactly. Thank you all for being here. Americans eat nearly 5 billion pounds of fish a year. The vast majority of that fish is imported. Now one Company Wants to build the largest fish farm in america off the coast of san diego. The proposed fishery would be about the size of central park. It could produce up to 11 Million Pounds of fish per year. But environmentalists are trying to block the project. Clair chesseker reports. Reporter don kent is peering into a water tank about the size of a backyard swimming pool. Hes waiting for his fish. Theres some big guys in there. Here they come. Reporter a school of ten yellowtails swim by, each about four feet long. Thats a big fish right there. Reporter kent heads the hub Seaworld Research institute. Hes leading us through the lab where his scientists are breeding fish. Hubs seaworld is partnering with a private Investment Firm to create the rose canyon fisheries aqua culture project. There are already fish farms in the United States but this one will be near san diegos popular beaches and will be the largest yet. At its largest the proposed farm would be 48 cables divided into two grids. The grids will cover about onefifth of a square mile, the same size as the parking lot around qualcomm stadium. Anchor lines will run from the cables cages to the bottom of the ocean. Those lines extend out so the whole project will cover about 1. 3 square miles. The cages could have poles that extend 16 feet above the water. But kent says we wont see them from the shore. He has computer modeling that shows the cages wont look like this, but like this. Because theyll be below the horizon. To test that out, i did some trigonometry. My calculations showed if youre lying on the ground at the oceans edge, youd see the top third of a 16foot pole. If youre standing up, you can see more. Environmental Group San Diego coast keeper is concerned about the scale of the project. On a cool morning a few weeks ago i boarded a small boat with matt omally. We set out from shelter island. After 45 minutes riding through some very choppy waters, we rounded point loma and stopped at a spot four miles off ocean beach. You come to a place like this, how quiet, pristine, beautiful it is. Reporter this is where rose canyon fisheries would go. Omally equates it to industrial farming. An animal feed lot. Like a giant constrained animal cow farm or pig farm. And with no environmental regulations, no property rights. Reporter because it would go in federal waters, rose canyon fisheries wouldnt buy or lease its space. It would have to get permits but the project is the first of its kind so there isnt an established federal agency to approve the project. If youre going to do it and say san diegos the proving ground for this, its a private venture on public propertity, were going to be the proving ground . We damn well better do it right. Reporter but kent is betting the u. S. Needs his project. Thats because 91 of its seafood is imported and countries like china that produce a lot of fish are now keeping more for themselves. So the price of seafoods going up higher and higher for People Like Us that have to import it. So the big advantage we have over those other supplies is from the fact that we can grow it locally. Reporter the u. S. Already does produce some seafood and doesnt eat it. Thats because americans dont always like the fish native to our coasts. So we import from other countries, according to food journalist paul greenburg. His book american catch describes a seafood swap. We tend to export strongertasting things like mackerel, black cod, a lot of squid. And then we import sort of neutraltasting things like shrimp, tilapia, very neutraltasting things that you can deep fry and use in the american palatefriendly sandwich. Reporter he says aqua culture can help correct this imbalance, but rather than trying to kind of start up in a new and complicated venture, first off, lets try and keep the fish that weve already got. Reporter aqua culture solves more global problems than americans not liking fishy fish, according to don kent with hub seaworld. Theres 7 billion people on effort now. Theres going to be 9 billion people before in your lifetime. Very, very soon. How are we going to feed those extra 2 billion people . Reporter omally with coast keeper has several environmental concerns. 11 Million Pounds of fish will create a lot of fish poop. He says that waste could hurt the water below the farm and the ocean floor and could lead to algae blooms. Fish could also escape the cages and then breed with wild populations, hurting their genetic diversity. Diseases in the farm could also spread to wild populations. And he says Marine Mammals like sea lions will be attracted to all of those caged fish. They might get caught in the farms cables or on its anchor lines. He says the farm could also change whale migrations and wild fish behavior. Were talking about putting a floating factory farm right off the coast of san diego. Reporter kent doesnt dispute its industrial farm label but says it wont hurt the environment. He says theyre using thick lines and plastic nets that wont entangle Marine Mammals. He modelled to show the farm is in deep enough farm to dilute the fish poop. The cages are designed so the fish wont escape and even if they did they wont have diseases to spread. Kent also says it will take eight years to scale the farm up to its full size and hell be monitoring its environmental impacts along the way just like he would with any farming project. But omally with coast keeper points out the projects permits are for its full size. So once its approved it could begin churning out more fish before the impacts are fully known. This is our backyard. This is a project that is massive and has a lot of potential impacts. We think as a community if were going to be embarking on a project like this, we want to make damn sure that environment is protected in the process. And that does it for us. For all of kqeds News Coverage go to kqednews. Org. Im thuy vu. Thanks for watching. Woman it kind of was, like, the bang that set off the night. Man that is the funkiest restaurant. Thomas the honey walnut prawns will make your insides smile. Woman 2 more tortillas, please man 2 what is comfort food if it isnt gluten and grease . Man 3 i love creme brulee. Woman 3 the octopus should have been, like, quadrapus, because it was really small. Sbrocco and you know that when you split something, all the calories evaporate, and then theres none. Whalen thats right