Arnold Schwarzenegger has called anti-maskers 'schmucks' and told Americans who are concerned about Covid-19 regulations encroaching on their rights: 'Screw your freedom.'

The former Republican California governor appeared on a YouTube chat show on Wednesday to urge people: 'There is a virus here, it kills people, and the only way we prevent it is get vaccinated, get masks, do social distancing, washing your hands all the time, and not just to think about "well my freedom is being kind of disturbed here." No, screw your freedom.'

The 74-year-old Terminator star said that just because people wanted liberty wasn't an excuse not to follow rules, comparing it to obeying traffic lights on the roads to keep other people safe.

'We put the traffic light at the intersection so someone doesn't kill someone else by accident… you cannot say, 'no one is going tell me that I'm going to stop here at this traffic light here, I'm going to go right through it', yeah, then you kill someone else and then it is your doing,' Schwarzenegger said.

The Hollywood legend has been a vocal proponent of Covid-19 safety measures and earlier this year shared an Instagram post of himself getting the vaccine.

In this week's video the Austrian-born actor warned of the rise of fascism in America, by comparing the pro-Trump mob that stormed the Capitol to Adolf Hitler's Brownshirt thugs in the streets of 1930s Germany.  

He warned about the dangers of 'lying to the nation' and said it had to be stopped at all costs.  

Schwarzenegger said it was important to follow the rules of the experts when it came to the pandemic but that there 'is misinformation out there' which means people are disregarding basics like hand washing and cleaning surfaces.