Perry says Obama yet to respond to 2010 letter on border security

Rick Perry doesn’t see Barack Obama as a responsive pen pal.

Back story: In August 2010, the Texas governor briefly met the president on the airport tarmac in Austin, where Obama was visiting for the day.

Perry mentioned the airport meeting when he appeared on CNN’s “The Situation Room” this April 5, saying that “the president hadn’t called up the governor of one of the largest states who has the longest border with Mexico and said, ‘Governor, what do you think we need to do about the issue of immigration?’ I would be open to that conversation any day.”

CNN’s Wolf Blitzer replied: “So if he calls you, are you ready to go to the White House and sit down with the president and try to come up with some sensible solutions to comprehensive immigration reform?”

“Absolutely,” Perry said. “As a matter of fact, I handed him a letter some two or three years ago on the tarmac at the Austin airport about that issue, about border security. And yet to get a response.”

No response?

When we inquired, Perry’s office shared a letter sent to Perry by a White House deputy, on Obama’s behalf, about three weeks after the leaders’ airport encounter.

This struck us as a response, making the governor’s statement to CNN both inaccurate and ridiculous.

Pants on Fire!

See the full fact check, joined by past checks of claims related to border security or immigration, to the right.