LOS ANGELES (AP) - Governor Schwarzenegger calls himself a "champion of immigrants."

Yesterday, he credited crediting citizen patrols with curbing illegal crossings along the Arizona-Mexican border.

Speaking with reporters at his downtown Los Angeles office today, the Republican governor appeared to temper his enthusiasm for the volunteer patrols he praised a day earlier for doing a "terrific job" discouraging illegal immigration.

Asked if he plans to visit the Minuteman monitors, the governor replied that he has no such plan. But Schwarzenegger said the most important thing is that he is a "champion of immigrants."

Noting he is an immigrant himself, Schwarzenegger said it is "extremely important" to go about entering the country in a legal way.

When asked it he was encouraging the group to continue the patrols, the governor said, "What I'm encouraging is to simply to ask the federal government to do their job. Their job is to secure the borders, and they have not done their job. When the government ... doesn't do its job, then the private citizens go out. It is like a neighborhood patrol."

(Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)