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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Wilson Announces Bid For Presidency Attacks Government As Rival Calls Him ‘Political Chameleon’

Michael Rezendes Boston Globe

California Gov. Pete Wilson formally declared his bid for the presidency Monday, and ran into a political buzzsaw when a rival candidate unveiled a radio ad that accuses him of raising taxes and changing his position on affirmative action.

Wilson - who has said he planned to run for the GOP’s nomination on several previous occasions - dismissed the ad as “pathetic,” after delivering speeches here and in New York in which he issued conservative broadsides against the federal government.

In New York, speaking near the Statue of Liberty, Wilson issued a sharp rebuke to what he described as “the oppression of federal tyrants.”

Here, at a historic waterfront park, he lashed out at government in Washington for restricting the ability of states to enact welfare reform.

“New Hampshire and California are proud and sovereign states. They are not colonies of the federal government,” Wilson said.

But Wilson’s thunder at the New Hampshire event was muffled by aides to former Tennessee Gov. Lamar Alexander, a rival presidential contender, who worked a crowd of nearly 100 with attacks on Wilson’s record.

“The bottom line is that Pete Wilson is a political chameleon,” said Scott Tranchemontagne, press secretary to Alexander’s New Hampshire campaign. “His message on the issue of the day is whatever is politically expedient.”

In a radio ad scheduled to begin airing in New Hampshire immediately, the Alexander camp attacks Wilson as someone who initially supported government affirmative action programs, broke a pledge to complete his current term as governor and presided over “the largest tax increase in California history.”