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Lawmaker assumed it was a hoax
When a man sounding remarkably like President-elect Barack Obama called a Florida congresswoman on Thursday, she assumed it was a hoax.
- AP
- Published: 23:35 December 4, 2008
Miami: When a man sounding remarkably like President-elect Barack Obama called a Florida congresswoman on Thursday, she assumed it was a hoax.
So Republican Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen hung up. But, the Miami Herald reports, this was no prank.
"I thought it was one of the radio stations in South Florida playing an incredible, elaborate, terrific prank on me," Ros-Lehtinen told the newspaper.
Obama had called up to congratulate Ros-Lehtinen on her re-election, saying he was looking forward to working with her as the ranking Republican member of the House Foreign Affairs committee, Ros-Lehtinen said.
The conversation lasted about a minute when she cut Obama off, telling him she wasn't falling for the hoax .
Then Rahm Emanuel, Obama's chief of staff, called the congresswoman to tell her it wasn't a joke. But she hung up on him, too.
It took a call from Rep. Howard Berman, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, to persuade Ros-Lehtinen that Obama really did want to talk to her.
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