Napolitano says border visits not photo-op jaunts

By Howard Fischer
CAPITOL MEDIA SERVICES

PHOENIX — Two trips to the border in two weeks is not an effort to gain re-election, Gov. Janet Napolitano said Wednesday.

Napolitano traveled to Nogales on Tuesday for several events, ranging from helping to open lanes at a port of entry and stopping by a conference on regional economic development to visiting with National Guard troops.

And just two weeks earlier she went to see Guard troops in San Luis, taking along Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius who, like Napolitano, is also up for re-election this year.

But Napolitano said the trips are not just "photo ops" to show her along the border.

"I think you can't manage the border unless you go to the border," she said. "And I've been going to the border, working on the issues down there, since I've been governor."

A statewide survey released last week showed that among all issues facing the state, illegal immigration is the one voters have the least confidence in Napolitano to solve. And several Republican gubernatorial candidates have attacked her vetoes in the last two years of measures they said would help border security.