Defiant Ferraro Defends Her Obama Comment

As Barack Obama supporters reacted angrily to her claims that the Illinois senator wouldn’t have gotten as far as he has in the ’08 race if he was white or female, former VP candidate and Clinton fundraiser Geraldine Ferraro said her statements were taken out of context and warned that Obama “shouldn’t antagonize people like me,” since, she said, he’d want her to raise money for him, too.

Update: Ferraro has resigned from Clinton’s finance committee. She wrote to Clinton: “The Obama campaign is attacking me to hurt you. I won’t let that happen.”

Boston.com:

The Clinton campaign quickly distanced itself from Ferraro’s comment, the latest racially tinged remark by a supporter.

Clinton told the Associated Press yesterday afternoon that she did not agree with Ferraro’s statement. “It is regrettable that any of our supporters on both sides — because we’ve both had that experience — say things that kind of veer off into the personal,” Clinton said. “We ought to keep this on the issues. There are differences between us. There are differences between our approaches on healthcare, on energy, on our experience, on our results that we’ve produced for people. That’s what this campaign should be about.”

Ferraro stood by her comment last night on the Fox News Channel, but said, “I’m sorry people thought it was racist.”

Clinton’s comments didn’t satisfy the Obama campaign.

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