Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin heavily criticized the Obama administration May 23 for what she considers to be its insufficient efforts to help clean up the recent oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
While speaking on Fox News Sunday, the former vice presidential candidate suggested that the White House’s lack of response to the incident may be due to the campaign contributions that Obama received from oil companies during his 2008 presidential race.
"I don’t know why the question isn’t asked… if there’s any connection there to President Obama taking so doggone long to get in there, to dive in there and grasp the complexity and the potential tragedy that we are seeing here in the Gulf of Mexico," she said.
Palin added that if former President George W. Bush was still in office, "the mainstream media would be all over his case."
The former governor noted later on her Twitter account that during the last 20 years the largest single donation by BP—the company responsible for the spill—was provided to Obama during his 2008 campaign.
In response to Palin’s comments, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told CBS’ Face the Nation that the White House is working around the clock to clean up the spill, and that most "oil companies don’t consider the Obama administration [to be] a huge ally."