Watch CBS News

Fiorina.org Used To Shame GOP Hopeful's Hewlett-Packard Legacy After Candidate Fails To Grab Domain

PALO ALTO (CBS SF) - CarlyForPresident.com is a slick website filled with background on Republican presidential hopeful Carly Fiorina. Fiorina.org is not.

The latter features only 27 words of text, including the following:

"Carly Fiorina failed to register this domain. So I'm using it to tell you how many people she laid off at Hewlett-Packard."

That statement is followed by a series of 30,000 frowning emoticons representing the people she's credited with letting go during her time at the helm of HP.

She was hired in 1999 as CEO of the Palo Alto company, then the world's largest technology firm and an iconic brand in American business. But Fiorina was fired six years later, after engineering a merger with Compaq, a leading competitor, a move viewed by some as a failure.

"I understand executive decision-making, which is making the tough call in the tough time with high stakes for which you're prepared to be held accountable," she said Monday after formally announcing her candidacy.

Considered an excellent communicator, Fiorina has a compelling personal story. She began her career as a secretary, earned an MBA and worked her way up at AT&T to become a senior executive at the telecom giant.

Fiorina became a prominent figure in Republican politics in 2010, when she ran for Senate in California and lost to incumbent Sen. Barbara Boxer by 10 points.

She enters a race for the Republican presidential nomination already home to several seasoned politicians, including Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky, Marco Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas. Others expected to join the race include several sitting and former governors. Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee made his campaign official Tuesday morning.

View CBS News In
CBS News App Open
Chrome Safari Continue
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.