OVO

The Arizona Daily Star reports: “President Bush’s re-election campaign insisted on knowing the race of an Arizona Daily Star journalist assigned to photograph Vice President Dick Cheney. The Star refused to provide the information. Cheney is scheduled to appear at a rally this afternoon at the Pima County Fairgrounds. A rally organizer for the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign asked Teri Hayt, the Star’s managing editor, to disclose the journalist’s race on Friday. After Hayt refused, the organizer called back and said the journalist probably would be allowed to photograph the vice president. “It was such an outrageous request, I was personally insulted,” Hayt said later. Danny Diaz, a spokesman for the president’s re-election campaign, said the information was needed for security purposes. [...] Journalists covering the president or vice president must undergo a background check and are required to provide their name, date of birth and Social Security number. The Star provided that information Thursday for Popat and this reporter. “That’s all anybody has been asked to provide,” said Hayt, adding that this is the first time in her 26-year career that a journalist’s race was made an issue.”

Capitol Hill Blue reports: “The widow of former President, and Republican icon, Ronald Reagan has told the GOP she wants nothing to do with their upcoming national convention or the re-election campaign of President George W. Bush. “Nancy Reagan turned down numerous invitations to appear at the Republican National Convention and has warned the Bush campaign she will not tolerate any use of her or her late husbands words or images in the President’s re-election effort.

“‘Mrs. Reagan does not support President Bush’s re-election and neither [do] most members of the President’s family,’ says a spokesman for the former First Lady.”