Updated Jun 12, 2012 - 4:17 pm
Jan Brewer blasts Obama as 'failure' in CA speech
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IRVINE, Calif. - Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer took her battle with President Obama on the road Monday.
Brewer was the keynote speaker at $150-per-ticket fundraiser for the Republican Party of Orange County in Irvine, California. She spent her entire 15 minute speech attacking the President.
"She called him a failure twice," said Martin Wisckol, a political reporter with The Orange County Register. "She criticized the growth of the national debt. She put that at his feet, as well cuts to defense spending, high unemployment, political divisiveness and, of course, illegal immigration."
Wisckol recounted Brewer as saying "this is what failure looks like," when talking about Obama. She then told the crowd, "I'm here to tell you what success looks like. It looks like Arizona."
Wisckol said that Brewer was surrounded by a famous picture as she spoke.
"They had a bigger-than-life photograph on either side of the stage of the governor with the president on the tarmac at the Phoenix airport back in January," he said. "She is waving her finger in the president's face."
Brewer would not tell the audience of 700 people what she was saying to Obama when the picture was taken. Wisckol said that she instead encouraged them that if they ever get the chance to talk to Obama, they should tell him "we don't need you...you're a failure."
The picture was captioned with the words "You Go Girl."
Brewer's spokesman, Mathew Benson, said that Orange County Republican Party was responsible for placing the picture on the stage and that the governor had nothing to do with it.
At least one person at the event asked for a picture with the governor, in which she posed wagging her finger at him in the same way.
Wisckol said it's ironic that 700 supporters turned out to see Brewer in California, where many people called for a boycott of Arizona after she signed SB 1070, Arizona's controversial immigration law.
"Governor Brewer has become an iconic figure, certainly not to the majority of the very Democratic state of California, but certainly to a very active anti-illegal immigration faction," said Wisckol.
Bob McClay, Reporter
