Move over, Jan Brewer, and make room for Kansas GOP Representative, Connie O’Brien. Unlike Brewer, who openly admitted she does not know what an undocumented person looks like (and still had the audacity to sign SB 1070 into law), Representative O’Brien thinks she knows.
When giving testimony regarding why undocumented students from Kansas should not be allowed to receive in-state tuition (they currently do), she had a personal story to tell. From Think Progress:
REP. O’BRIEN: My son who’s a Kansas resident, born here, raised here, didn’t qualify for any financial aid. Yet this girl was going to get financial aid. My son was kinda upset about it because he works and pays for his own schooling and his books and everything and he didn’t think that was fair. We didn’t ask the girl what nationality she was, we didn’t think that was proper. But we could tell by looking at her that she was not originally from this country. […]
REP. GATEWOOD: Can you expand on how you could tell that they were illegal?
REP. O’BRIEN: Well she wasn’t black, she wasn’t Asian, and she had the olive complexion.
Sadly, there’s more. After being asked to apologize for her thoughtless remarks, the Representative has apparently decided that she’s not going to apologize until she’s “had time to think,” according to the Kansas City Star.
Sounds like Representative O’Brien would fit right in with Reps. Lamar Smith, Elton Gallegly and Steve King. They’ve also got problems with olive complexion, which obviously means the Hispanic population — only the fastest growing voting demographic in the country. (Here’s a hint: In 2011, US Citizenship isn’t based on skin tone, so many of those with “olive complexions” are from this country — and they vote). O’Brien is clearly doing her part to permanently alienate those voters with 2012 around the corner.
