This is a rush transcript from "On the Record," May 9, 2011. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
MARTHA MACCALLUM, FOX NEWS "ON THE RECORD" GUEST HOST: Welcome back, everybody. Well, Arizona's governor, Jan Brewer, is fighting back against the federal government. She's taking her border fight all the way to the Supreme Court! She's hoping to overturn the ruling that put parts of her controversial illegal immigration law in a deep freeze.
Governor Jan Brewer joins us now live from Phoenix. Governor, welcome. Good to have you with us tonight.
GOV. JAN BREWER, R-ARIZ.: Thank you, Martha. It's great to be back with you.
MACCALLUM: It is great to have you. So you know, originally -- you had a couple of options here. You could have gone back to the 9th circuit and gone for an appeal. Now you're trying to push this process to the Supreme Court. How do you -- how do you think that will be received? And when will you know whether or not they're going to take it on?
BREWER: Well, we probably won't find out if they decide to take it until probably around October. But you know, we had to make that decision because we had to get our legal teams together and get our plan all put forth so that we can win the -- we had to make a decision whether -- like you mentioned, whether to go back to the 9th circuit, but we thought we just need to move because this is a much quicker fix and get this resolved for the state of Arizona, for America.
MACCALLUM: I mean, I would imagine you thought you'd be spinning your wheels in the 9th circuit if you went back there.
BREWER: Well, yes, absolutely. The -- you know, the bottom line is, is that every knows that the 9th circuit has a reputation of being very, very liberal and -- but I thought maybe two bites at the apple maybe we would be better prepared for the Supreme Court. But then after
deliberating and thinking about it, I said, Let's just go to the Supreme Court.
You know, these things are so expensive and they take so long. And in the meantime, Arizona is just bearing the -- the brunt of all the illegal immigration in the country! And so we -- I decided that we need to move forward and ...
MACCALLUM: And what is your...
BREWER: ... we're going to do just...
MACCALLUM: What's your team telling you about, you know, how the Supreme Court is likely to take this on and what they will take into consideration in terms of figuring out whether or not they believe this a constitutional argument? Because obviously, your detractors say, you know, that the immigration issues that you've taken on in your state are to be dealt with at the federal level.
BREWER: Well, and I'm not a lawyer, but you know, I believe that they believe because that Senate bill 1070 mirrors the federal law that it's no different. And if they're are not going to enforce that law, then why can't Arizona help them enforce the law? The bottom line is, is it is their job. They are not doing it. We're going to step up and we're going to do it, if we can, in a manner which protects the people of Arizona.
Arizona, Martha -- we are frustrated. The people are frustrated.This issue is not going to go away.
MACCALLUM: Yes.
BREWER: The bottom line is, is that other legislation has already been introduced this last year -- this year...
MACCALLUM: And you've already started the ball rolling. You're talking about building the fence on your own.
BREWER: Right.
MACCALLUM: And that message is going to be right up against President Obama, who's going to be on the Texas border, right across the border from one of the most dangerous towns in the world. And that's coming up tomorrow.
BREWER: Right. Exactly. But I don't believe that he probably would have been there tomorrow if we hadn't been pushing and pushing and pushing this action. And you know, we kept forcing the issue that we wanted more National Guard, and they responded. And for that, I'm grateful. But then they started to withdraw those National Guard, and we pushed back. I wrote other letters.
And tomorrow will be interesting to find out just exactly what his comments are. I believe that tomorrow, he's going to be talking about comprehensive immigration. Well, that's not going to sell in Arizona. I don't think it's going to sell in America. I believe he's doing it for political reasons. And I think that no one wants to talk about any of these other issues until we get our borders secured, period!
MACCALLUM: Well, we'll be watching. It'll be your message up against his in a very fine, pointed way. Thank you so much for being with us tonight, Governor. We'll be following your story.
BREWER: Thank you.
MACCALLUM: Good to have you with us.
BREWER: Thank you.
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