OSU alumna Fallin gathers student support
October 13, 2009The OSU Daily Collegian
By Nick lan Emenhiser
U.S. Rep. Mary Fallin, R-Okla., returned to her alma mater Monday evening to speak to College Republicans.
Fallin represents Oklahoma’s fifth congressional district and is running for governor.
Fallin said she is “proud of Oklahoma for being the reddest state in the nation.”
“That’s gonna make it a great election year for us,” she said.
Her speech touched on her accomplishments in Oklahoma and Washington, as well as her bid for governor, in an attempt to draw supporters.
Last week, her opponent for the Republican nomination, Randy Brogdon, R-Owasso, spoke to the College Republicans and said Fallin was pro-stimulus but Fallin said she isn’t.
“I don’t support the stimulus, I don’t support socialized health care either and I’m pro-life and pro-NRA,” Fallin said.
She entered statewide politics in 1990 as a state representative.
The confusion about Fallin’s pro-stimulus stance exists because she supported the Bush-backed bailout package.
“Within the 15-minute period of our first vote (against the bailout), the stock market instantly dropped a record-breaking 777 points on our vote alone,” Fallin said. “I knew that people had just lost their retirement funds.”
Former Payne County official Alice Boydstun came to the event to get a hug from Fallin.
Boydstun said she is proud to be a long-time Fallin supporter.
“She is grace under fire,” Boydstun said. “A 100 percent class act.
“On the day she announced her campaign for Congress she still came to our Payne County Republican Women’s meeting because she made a commitment, and that’s why I like Mary.”
Thomas Schneider, a political science sophomore, said he’ll vote for Fallin without a doubt.
“We have cultivated a lot of economic development in (specific towns), but as governor, she will bring it to the forefront,” Schneider said. “Her experience is what we need, and we really do need some federal experience in the governor’s office.
“I really look at Oklahoma as a blank slate. There is still a lot of work to be done.”
Fallin left the possibility of a debate between her and Brogdon coming to OSU open, which College Republicans has pushed.
Fallin joked that while she is at a congressional reception at the Red River Shootout this weekend, she’ll secretly be wearing orange.
“I bleed pure orange,” she said.
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