If you're a Washington Democrat, Republican, or just a "self-styled do-gooder," Governor Jan Brewer says you're not helping solve the illegal immigration problem.
Brewer was the keynote speaker at the Border Security Conference and Expo in Phoenix yesterday, where companies were showing off products to be used in securing the border, like surveillance drones, vehicles, and guns (KTAR has pictures).
The moral of her speech: She's doing the right thing, and everyone else is just in the way. As evidence, she cited her views as "the truth" six times during her speech.
"My opponents have already painted me as hard-hearted and uncompassionate, Brewer said. "They're wrong. My career, my record, my life, all stands as proof as to how wrong the critics are. The truth I've come to share with you is anything but hateful. It has nothing to do with skin color, nothing to do with extremism. Instead, it's rooted in freedom."
Brewer said "those in Washington" will tell you the border's "more secure than ever" -- which we're assuming includes US Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, who says that exact thing.
Brewer cited slain rancher Robert Krentz, Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, and a few anecdotal examples in an attempt to explain that the border and the state aren't any safer.
Of course, someone has to take the blame.
"Those are the facts, plain and simple," Brewer said of her examples. "Our opponents, the self-styled do-gooders, try mightily to bury them. They spin and shout, hate and denounce. To disagree with them, I've learned, is to suffer incredible verbal abuse."
Then it's Washington's fault.
"The federal government -- Republicans and Democrats alike -- has failed every single American. All of us," the governor said. "Washington's abdication of responsibility is the overarching outrage of America's illegal immigration crisis. "
As you may recall, Brewer was invited to have this conversation with "Washington," in a Senate subcommittee hearing hosted by New York Democratic Senator Charles Schumer.
She'll still have to have a similar conversation with the Supreme Court, as SB 1070's going to be the topic in April.
Click here to read a copy of the governor's speech, provided by her political-action committee.
