Jefferson City - The Missouri Republican Party today called on Senator McCaskill to denounce Senator Obama’s divisive comments made at a San Francisco fundraiser. Senator Obama said:

You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them… And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations…

It is unbelievable that a presidential candidate would assert that people in this country ‘cling to guns and religion’ simply out of frustration. It is offensive to allege that Middle America’s attitudes about immigration or trade come from being “bitter” and not intelligence.

“Missourians have a strong devotion to their faith, believe in their Constitutional right to bear arms, and believe that our government should be actively looking to solve the illegal immigration crisis in our country. Only an elitist would say that people vote their values only out of frustration,” said Tina Hervey, Communications Director of the Missouri Republican Party, “McCaskill and every other Missouri Democrat who supports him should immediately denounce Obama’s remarks.”