New Romney Ad Hits Obama on Auto Bailout
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JEWEL SAMAD/AFP/GettyImages(WASHINGTON) — Mitt Romney’s campaign released a new ad on Wednesday hammering President Obama on the auto bailout before the president’s trip to Ohio.
The ad, titled “Dream,” highlights the story of former Ohio auto dealership owner Al Zarzour, who lost his business during the 2009 bailout of General Motors.
“I received a letter from General Motors,” Zarzour says amid images of a shuttered auto dealership. “They were suspending my credit line. We had 30-some employees that were out of work.”
“My wife and I were the last ones there,” he continues. “You know, it was like the dream that we worked for, and that we worked so hard for was gone.”
Romney has argued that the auto bailout was not the appropriate measure to deal with the auto crisis and instead pushed for a “managed bankruptcy.”
Responding to the ad Wednesday, Obama for America spokesperson Frank Benenati said in a statement: “Let’s get this straight — the very person who argued for the U.S. auto industry to go bankrupt, something that would have caused more than a million jobs lost and utter economic devastation in the midwest, is now trying to attack the president on how it was handled? This ad in Ohio is a new low for the Romney campaign, and instead of trying to deceive Ohioans they should get their facts straight because there are now 2,200 more Ohioans employed in dealerships than when the president took office.”
“While the President was busy saving the U.S. auto industry — which has 1 in 8 Ohio jobs tied to it — Mitt Romney was busy arguing that we should turn our backs on an iconic industry and the workers in Ohio. The Romney campaign will say anything in this election, and this ad is proof positive of that,” the statement continued.
In addition to the ad, the Romney campaign released a web video called “Time for a Change,” hitting Obama on unemployment.
Obama, who will campaign in Mansfield and Akron, Ohio on Wednesday, released a new ad of his own Tuesday in six battleground states: Colorado, Florida, Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and Ohio. The spot casts Romney as someone who would increase the deficit in the same way as President George. W. Bush.
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