Washington state Representative Joe Fitzgibbon, a Democrat, said the state of Arizona was a “desert racist wasteland” after the Arizona Cardinals beat the Seattle Seahawks in Seattle on Sunday. He then promptly deleted his tweet and did not apologize for it.
The 17-10 loss on Carson Palmer’s touchdown pass to Michael Floyd was Seattle’s first home loss this year and star quarterback Russell Wilson’s first loss at CenturyLink Field. Fitzgibbon did not apologize for his comments and said he was upset over the failure of immigration reform, which was President Barack Obama’s top priority last year. Arizona is home to the S.B. 1070 law, which has broad public support and requires officers to ask for the immigration status of people if they have a “reasonable suspicion” they were in the country illegally. The Supreme Court upheld that provision while striking down three others in a 2012 ruling.
Upset re hawks loss, and failure of smart immigration reform–shouldn’t have conflated the 2 though. Happy holidays, better for both in ’14
— Joe Fitzgibbon (@joefitzgibbon) December 23, 2013
A vice president of media relations for the Arizona Cardinals chimed in on Twitter in response:
You mad Joe? RT @danbickley: Washington state rep @joefitzgibbon tweeted it sucked losing to a “desert racist wasteland.”
— MarkDalton (@CardsMarkD) December 23, 2013
Here is a screenshot of Fitzgibbon’s original tweet:
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