Accusations of religious insensitivity, faulty reporting in AZ-8

Both the campaign of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Tucson) and the Arizona Democratic Party accused state Sen. Pres. Tim Bee (R-Tucson) of religious intolerance Tuesday for criticizing Giffords's return to Arizona during the Rosh Hashanah holiday.

Bee put out a statement earlier Tuesday in which he decried Giffords's return to Tucson Monday night. In the statement, he urged her to "follow her own advice and rush back to Washington, put politics aside and develop solutions as quickly as she rushed to Arizona to campaign against me."

However, Giffords, who is Jewish, plans to stay in Arizona throughout Rosh Hashanah, which doesn't end until Wednesday at sundown. According to her congressional spokesman C.J. Karamargin, Giffords plans to fly back to Washington, D.C. either Wednesday night or Thursday morning, after the Jewish New Year is over.

"For anyone to criticize someone for their religious beliefs, it's unconscionable," said Karamargin. "If that is indeed the basis of the criticism then it is a sorry statement on the state of his campaign and the depths that he's sunk to. To be criticized for celebrating a religious holiday is completely out of bounds."

The Arizona Democratic Party followed suit, issuing a press release that called for Bee to apologize.

"It's stunning that Tim Bee would attack Congresswoman Giffords for returning home to celebrate a religious holiday with her family," said Emily DeRose, spokeswoman for the Arizona Democratic Party, in the release. "The Congresswoman is one of the hardest working members of Congress. To attack her for spending one sacred day with her family is beyond the pale."

Tom Dunn, spokesman for the Bee campaign, said the criticism was based on a report in the Arizona Daily Star that said Giffords would be campaigning during the holiday.

"Of course if the Daily Star article is not correct, we apologize," Dunn told PolitickerAZ.com. "It wasn't the intent to be discourteous."

Karamargin said of the article, "I don't know where the line [about Giffords campaigning] comes from."

"Had someone asked," he said, "I would have told them Congresswoman Giffords has no official or campaign events scheduled for today." 

As for the call for Giffords to "rush back to Washington," Dunn said it was "reasonable to determine that that would mean after the holiday is over."

"The intent of the statement is simply to point out America is in the midst of a serious economic crisis, and Congress should get back to work as quickly as possible," said Dunn. 

Later, in an email to PolitickerAZ.com, Dunn pointed out that Giffords and Bee are scheduled to face off against each other at a school in Catalina Foothills, but did not say whether the initial statement taking Giffords to task over campaiging still stood. 

An after hours call was put in to the Daily Star reporter who wrote the original article, but was not returned as of Tuesday night.