Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer received an earful from President Obama when she met him on an airport tarmac outside Phoenix yesterday - and responded in kind.
The Democratic chief executive and Republican governor could be seen engaged in an intense conversation right at the base of Air Force One's steps.
Both could be seen smiling, but speaking forecefully at the same time. At one point, Jan Brewer pointed a finger directly in Barack Obama's face. Why?
Asked later what the conversation was about, Brewer, who recently published Scorpions for Breakfast, said, "He was a little disturbed about my book."
Something of a memoir of her years growing up, Scorpions defends her signing of Arizona's controversial law cracking down on undocumented immigrants.
Obama, who opposes that law, was objecting to Brewer's description of a meeting they had at the White House in June 2010. Bad blood has boiled since.
Brewer described Obama as lecturing her like "a little kid in a classroom, if you will, and he was this wise professor ... I felt minimized to say the least."
The Governor also said that later that year, Obama blew her off when he was in town to deliver the commencement address at Arizona State University.
On the tarmac Wednesday, Brewer handed Obama an envelope with a handwritten invitation to meet her for lunch and to join her for a visit to the border.
"I said to him, you know, I have always respected the office of the president and that the book is what the book is," she told reporters Wednesday.
She said Obama was upset that she wrote he was not cordial: "I said that I was sorry he felt that way. Anyway, we're glad he's here, and we'll regroup."
The President is visiting the Grand Canyon State to push for initiatives laid out in his State of the Union address, which began his reelection bid in earnest.
Obama in 2012?