JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) — President Obama suggested that European austerity should be tempered with efforts to stimulate growth, as the eight leaders of the world’s largest economies gathered at Camp David for a summit that was also expected to touch on Iran’s nuclear ambitions and the ongoing bloodshed in Syria.
The economy is at the top of the agenda Saturday and German Chancellor Angela Merkel is expected to be front and center as Obama pushes her to focus more on growth and less on austerity.
“We are very committed to making sure growth and stability and fiscal consolidation is something that all of us are trying to achieve,” Obama said.
Today’s focus on the Eurozone comes on the heels of elections in France and Greece that ushered in new leaders who are focused on growth, a blatant rejection of the austerity model championed by Germany.
The second day of the G-8 summit kicked off Saturday morning after a cozy slumber party at Camp David, with Obama formally thanking the leaders for making the trip to his country home in Maryland’s Catoctin Mountains for the meeting.
Seated around a wooden table in a paneled room so small that Obama quipped that press photographers were only welcome “as long as [they] don’t break anything,” he rattled off the major issues of the summit, beginning with Iran.
“I think all of us agree that Iran has the right to peaceful nuclear power, but that its continuing violations of international rules and norms and its inability thus far to convince the world community that it is not pursuing the weaponization of nuclear power is something of grave concern to all of us,” Obama said. “And our hope is that we can resolve this issue in a peaceful fashion that respects Iran’s sovereignty and its rights in the international community, but also recognizes its responsibilities.”
The United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China are slated to meet with Iranian leaders Wednesday in Baghdad in the next round of nuclear negotiations.
The president also expressed his concern for the continuing violence in Syria, but reiterated his support for the six-point peace plan negotiated by former U.S. Secretary General Kofi Annan.
“We’re supportive of the Annan plan and agree that the Annan plan should be fully implemented and a political process has to move forward in a more timely fashion to resolve that issue,” Obama said.
The full complement 300 unarmed U.N. monitors are expected to arrive in Syria by the end of May, though violence continues nearly a month after the Syrian government ostensibly accepted the plan.
North Korea and Burma were also mentioned Saturday morning and the president suggested that Afghanistan will be the hot-button issue of this week’s NATO Summit in Chicago.
“We want to make sure that we recognize the need for Afghanistan to sustain a development plan,” he said.
The leaders arrived Friday night for a welcome dinner and Obama called the discussions thus far “very fruitful.”
After Saturday’s first two working sessions, the eight leaders gathered outside for the G-8 family photo, that awkward, annual ritual.
In Washington, first lady Michelle Obama will host the G-8 spouses — and French President Francois Hollande’s girlfriend — at the White House for a tour and “intimate lunch” catered by famed celebrity chef Jose Andres.
Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy(WASHINGTON) -- In the wake of JPMorgan Chase’s staggering trading loss, President Obama is urging Republicans to “keep moving forward” and finish implementing Wall Street reform.
“We can’t afford to go back to an era of weak regulation and little oversight; where excessive risk-taking on Wall Street and a lack of basic oversight in Washington nearly destroyed our economy. We can’t afford to go back to that brand of ‘you’re-on-your-own’ economics. Not after the American people have worked so hard to come back from this crisis,” the president said in his weekly address.
The financial overhaul of 2010 is a key component of the president’s campaign as he seeks to contrast his record on the economy with that of his GOP rival Mitt Romney.
“We’ve put in place Wall Street reform with smarter, tougher, commonsense rules that serve one primary purpose: to prevent a crisis like that from ever happening again. And yet, for the past two years, too many Republicans in Congress and an army of financial industry lobbyists have actually been waging an all-out battle to delay, defund, and dismantle Wall Street reform,” Obama said.
Romney supports repealing the law, claiming it imposes excessive regulations.
“Unless you run a financial institution whose business model is built on cheating consumers, or making risky bets that could damage the whole economy, you have nothing to fear from Wall Street reform,” Obama said. The president’s comments capped a week campaign attacks against Romney’s business practices as head of the Bain Capital private equity firm.
“I believe the free market is one of the greatest forces for progress in human history; that businesses are the engine of growth; that risk-takers and innovators should be celebrated. But I also believe that at its best, the free market has never been a license to take whatever you want, however you can get it. Alongside our entrepreneurial spirit and rugged individualism, America only prospers when we meet our obligations to one another; and to future generations,” Obama concluded.
US Senate(WASHINGTON) -- Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin delivers this week's Republican address, marking this week's Senate vote of 99-0 against a budget amendment represented as President Obama's budget request.
With a background in private sector accounting and manufacturing, Johnson says that he is used to "getting things done ... producing results."
"But that's not what's happening in the United States Senate," the senator says in the address.
Sen. Johnson lays in to Senate Democrats placing blame on the lawmakers for the Senate's failure to pass a budget in three years.
"Even though families and most businesses produce budgets to help control their finances, the largest financial entity in the world is operating without one," he says. "Why? Because Democrats in the Senate refuse to be held accountable. They either don't have a plan, or they simply do no want their fingerprints on one."
But, he says, "Republicans have proven that we are willing to be held accountable. Since regaining a majority in the House, Republicans have fulfilled our responsibility every year by passing a budget."
Johnson says that despite House GOP's efforts to pass a budget, those attempts have died in the Democratic-controlled Senate. He further points out that the president's budget has failed repeatedly in both the Senate and House.
"This is a stunning repudiation of his leadership. At a time when America requires sober financial management, President Obama's fiscal plans have been so unserious, that not a single member of his own party supported them with their vote," Johnson says.
ABC News' Jake Tapper reported earlier this week, however, that the most recent "versions" of the president's budget, rejected in the House and Senate have been called Republican "gimmicks" and stunts by White House officials.
The budget amendment, introduced by Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Miss., and voted down 99-0 in the Senate, proposed many of the same topline numbers, but offered no specifics and appeared to be heavily condensed at just 56 pages long. In fact, the Senate Budget Committee's top Democrat explained his party's inability to support this week's rejected proposal.
"This is the president's budget," Sen. Kent Conrad, D-S.D., said referring to the much larger budget proposal offered by President Obama. "This is what Sen. Sessions has presented as being the president's budget," referring to the slimmer 56-page document, voted down in the Senate.
"I think it's readily apparent there is a big difference between the President's budget, which I hold in my hands, and what Sen. Sessions has presented as being the president's budget. This is not the president's budget. So, of course, we're not going to support it. It's not what the president proposed," Conrad said.
Still, Johnson says that without a budget, America's fiscal house is in "total disarray," for which President Obama "offers no solutions."
"If you're concerned about the financial future of America, these are not encouraging results," he says.
TOBY JORRIN/AFP/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) -- House Speaker John Boehner said “all options are on the table” when asked if the House would move to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt should he refuse to fully comply with the ongoing congressional investigation into the “Fast and Furious” operation.
“We want to hold everyone at the Department of Justice and the administration accountable for what happened or what didn’t happen in ‘Fast and Furious.’ All options are on the table,” Boehner said Friday in an interview for This Week to air in full this Sunday.
The House GOP leadership sent a letter to Holder Friday that cited a “lack of full cooperation from the Department of Justice” in terms of the current investigation. ABC News’ John Parkinson reported that the letter was sent after a group of freshmen GOP representatives urged Speaker Boehner to bring a Contempt of Congress resolution to the House floor for a vote.
House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, however, dismissed the idea that Holder may be in contempt.
“I don’t believe he’s in contempt of Congress. No,” Pelosi said in a This Week interview. “My understanding is that the attorney general has handed over … thousands of paperwork on the -- ‘Fast and Furious,’ that some that is withheld relates to criminal prosecution and other -- whether -- executive privilege or whatever. But whatever he can hand over, I think he should.”
Interviews with both Boehner and Pelosi will air Sunday on This Week.
Office of the Secretary of State, AZ(PHOENIX) -- Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett wants you to know that he is not a birther, but he says he wants proof of Barack Obama’s citizenship before putting his name on the Arizona ballot.
In an interview Friday, Bennett said he is just doing his job of making sure “that those people whose names are on the ballot have met the qualifications for the office they are seeking.” He says he has been trying for eight weeks to get documents from Hawaii.
In a statement just released, Bennett says:
“First, I have been on the record since 2009 that I believe the president was born in Hawaii. I am not a birther. At the request of a constituent, I asked the state of Hawaii for a verification in lieu of a certified copy. We’re merely asking them to officially confirm they have the president’s birth certificate in their possession and are awaiting their response.”
Matt Roberts, Bennett’s spokesman, said in an email that Bennett had not asked for Romney’s Michigan birth certificate because “This was simply in response to some constituents asking us to ask Hawaii,” he said.
ABC/ Ida Mae Astute(MANCHESTER, N.H.) -- Mitt and Ann Romney have given a combined $150,000 from their personal fortune to aide the candidate’s bid for the White House.
This is the first time the candidate or his wife has contributed monetarily to their 2012 campaign.
“If Mitt Romney’s asking donors to contribute the maximum, then the least he and Ann can do is make the same contribution,” a senior adviser to Romney told ABC News.
Both the candidate and his wife gave $75,000 -- the maximum amount allowed under Federal Election Commission guidelines -- to the Romney Victory Fund, the joint fundraising account formed by the Romney campaign and the Republican National Committee.
Up until this point, the Romneys had not donated to the campaign. Romney is said to be worth approximately $230 million, according to Forbes. During his 2008 presidential campaign, Romney reported giving more than $44 million to his campaign. That’s about $9 of his own money for each vote he got.
The Romney campaign announced earlier this week that it has raised, in a joint effort with the RNC, $40.1 million in the month of April.
Joe Raedle/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) -- Vice President Joe Biden said Thursday that it’s understandable why 40 percent of Democrats in this month’s West Virginia presidential primary opted for a convicted felon serving time in a Texas prison over incumbent President Barack Obama.
“When you’re out of work, man, it’s a depression. And a lot of people are still hurting because of this god-awful recession we inherited that cost 8.4 million jobs before we could really get going. And so I don’t blame people; they’re frustrated, they’re angry,” Biden said in an interview with WTOV-TV in Martin’s Ferry, Ohio.
“At the end of the day, they’re going to decide, is the way back to their employment, is the way back to them being able to have a job and raise a family, is it under the value-set and the ideas of Romney, or is it under ours?” he said. “And we feel confident we’ll do just fine.”
Biden’s response -- that he doesn’t “blame people” for supporting the felon -- diverges from the case that some national Democrats made in the wake of the vote, suggesting that the outcome likely reflected racial opposition to Obama. It also seemed to part with efforts by top Democratic leaders to project a sense of party unity as the campaign heads toward November.
While Obama has never been widely popular in West Virginia, the fact that Keith Russell Judd -- an inmate at the Beaumont Federal Correctional Institution in Beaumont, Texas -- scored roughly 49,000 votes to Obama’s more than 67,000 raised some eyebrows.
Judd is serving time for extortion and threats made at the University of New Mexico in 1999. Neither he nor Obama campaigned in the state ahead of the May 8 vote.
Obama campaign officials have pointed out that in spite of Judd, Obama won more overall votes in the primary than did Mitt Romney, who won roughly 51,000.
Jeff Swensen/Getty Images(HILLSBOROUGH, N.H.) -- Mitt Romney ventured to the Granite State Friday to stand in front of an abandoned 19th century stone bridge to highlight what he considers to be President Obama’s “wasteful” spending.
“You all know the story of this bridge, this is part of the president’s stimulus plan,” said Romney. “He went out and borrowed $787 billion and said that if we’re allowing him as Congress allowed him to borrow that kind of money, that he would hold unemployment below eight percent and it hasn’t been below eight percent since.”
“Now a lot of people said, ‘Boy that’s just outrageous,’” Romney continued. “So they said, 'Yeah, but we put in place a whole series of elements that are critical to the future of America.’”
“And you got one behind us right there,” Romney added, pointing to the bridge behind him, which received more than $150,000 in stimulus funds meant to go toward its restoration. Despite that money, the bridge stands idle now.
“That’s what they’re saying this is the absolute bridge to nowhere, if there ever was one. That’s your stimulus dollars at work,” Romney said. “A bridge that goes nowhere. So I hope the president comes here, takes a look at some of his stimulus programs and there’s a long list by the way of stimulus programs.”
As Romney spoke, ticking off the reasons he believes the bridge exemplifies failed policies by the Obama administration, supporters of the president stood nearby chanting “Obama! Obama!”
Romney addressed the crowd, saying, “It doesn’t get better than this. And you know we have behind us a Greek chorus.”
“And I say that because they remind us that this president is leading us towards Greece,” said Romney. “And one reason we’re going to get rid of him so that we make sure that we don’t continue to have the kind of deficits that lead to Greece. So I hope they keep up with their Greek chorus over there.”
“It is without question the largest one time careless expenditure of government money in American history,” said Romney, still tweaking the stimulus. “And the bad news is it was not just wasteful spending, it was wasteful borrowing as well.”
Romney’s stop in New Hampshire rounded out a week of campaigning across the country, events that all focused on the spending and debt crisis.
Obama campaign spokeswoman Lis Smith said in the statement that Romney’s speech in New Hampshire Friday simply repeated his “broken promises.”
Smith said in her statement that Romney’s values of “reaping quick profits for himself and his investors at the expense of workers and communities” are the “values that he wants to bring to the White House by giving more budget-busting tax cuts to the wealthy and letting Wall Street write its own rules-the same formula that benefited a few, but crashed our economy and punished the middle class.”
“Americans won’t be fooled by Romney’s broken promises-and Romney economics-again,” said Smith.
JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) -- President Obama’s re-election campaign is courting voters in Florida and Nevada with a new 30-second TV ad on higher education.
The spot, which began airing Friday, features pictures of a young Obama with his mother at school as the narrator paints a picture of a president who understands the importance of education.
“His mother got him up before dawn to do schoolwork. She knew what it meant for his future. With hard work and student aid, his life was transformed,” she says.
The ad touts Obama’s efforts to give “young people the chance to compete like he did” by doubling funding for college grants, capping some student loan payments and enacting a tax credit to help offset college costs.
The positive message on education is part of a broader, $25 million TV ad campaign across nine battleground states, which launched on May 7, an Obama campaign official said.
The anchor of that flight of ads is a minute-long spot dubbed “Go” that touts Obama’s first term record.
A spokesman for Republican Mitt Romney said Friday that his campaign would be focusing on education issues next week.
Official White House photo by Pete Souza(WASHINGTON) -- Conservatives are ribbing President Obama for adding factoids about himself to the end of presidential biographies on the White House website and for past statements ranking his administration among the greatest in U.S. history.
A new web video by the pro-Republican super PAC American Crossroads playfully tweaks Obama for the moves, clearly suggesting that he does not deserve to be held in such high esteem.
Over a soundtrack of grandiose, Baroque music, a British-accented narrator mockingly heralds “another great moment in presidential history.”
“America has seen its share of great presidents with historic accomplishments. But did you know that Barack Obama is SO great his name has been added to the bottom of biographies of 13 presidents? It’s right there on his White House website,” he says.
A clip of Obama from a December 2011 60 Minutes interview then appears inside a gold-trimmed frame with the placard “Undisputed Debt King”: “I would put our legislative and foreign policy accomplishments in our first two years against any president with the possible exceptions of Johnson, FDR, and Lincoln,” Obama told CBS’ Steve Kroft.
(Obama at the time did qualify his comment by saying that he had more work to do on improving the economy and had “five more years of stuff to do.”)
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Vice President Joe Biden, both praised publicly by Obama as historic figures, are also mentioned in the video.
“America’s fourth greatest president, second greatest treasury secretary and 47th greatest vice president. Together, only they could raise the debt limit to 16 trillion and keep 13 million Americans out of work,” the narrator says, highlighting what has been the focus of Republicans’ case against a second Obama term.
There is no mention of the role George W. Bush played in contributing to mounting debt and deficits with two wars and massive tax cuts, or his presiding over the start of the 2008 financial crisis.
White House sources have said the additions to presidential biography pages, which include hyperlinks to other Obama-related content, are common practice on the internet to direct traffic to other pages on the site. They also note that the references do not alter the historical bios, but are simply innocuous, related factoids.
Crossroads, a group co-founded by Republican strategist Karl Rove, also launched a $25 million TV ad campaign against President Obama earlier this week, attacking him for “broken promises” during his first term.
Heather Kennedy/WireImage(WASHINGTON) -- It’s been nearly two years since Al and Tipper Gore announced their separation after 40 years of marriage, and now Mr. Gore has a girlfriend.
The Nobel Laureate and former vice president is seriously dating Elizabeth Keadle, a friend close to Liz confirms to ABC News. She’s described by The Washington Post as a “well-heeled Democratic donor from Southern California in her 50s with a background in science and a devotion to environmental causes.”
It’s not clear when the couple first starting dating, but the two have similar interests and seem to have been running in the same circles for years.
Keadle has long been a supporter of Democratic causes, donating hundreds of thousands of dollars to Democratic candidates at all levels of government. She and her ex-husband, Lyle Turner, were reportedly among the early investors in a venture that eventually became Gore’s cable channel CurrentTV.
According to a 2002 San Diego Reader article, Gore attended a fundraiser held in San Diego by the Friends of Albert Gore, Jr., Inc. PAC – to which Turner and Keadle were major donors. In 2008, Keadle was one of California’s electors in the Electoral College pledged to the Obama/Biden ticket.
Gore is perhaps most famous in his post-White House years for his environmental work, for which he won a Nobel Peace Prize. His film An Inconvenient Truth, directed by Davis Guggenheim, won an Academy Award. Keadle, who has listed her occupation on donation forms as biochemist, is actively involved in environmental work as a member of the San Elijo Lagoon Conservancy’s President’s Council in San Diego County. She was one of a large group of celebrities, environmentalists and scientists who traveled with Gore to Antarctica in January this year.
For her part, Tipper Gore has been largely out of the spotlight since the split, apparently focusing on her photography and charitable work. Most recently, she was the honorary chair at an event hosted earlier this week by the Flawless Foundation, a charity her daughter Karenna is also involved in.
Despite evidently leading separate lives, the Gores have been seen together since announcing their separation, and don’t seem to have taken any steps towards divorce.
SAUL LOEB/AFP/GettyImages(WASHINGTON) -- George W. Bush and Mitt Romney have connected.
Bush and Romney spoke with each other after the former president offered his fleeting support for the Republican candidate in an elevator this week, a person on Romney’s campaign tells ABC News.
The Romney aide wouldn’t disclose details of the call and wouldn’t say if Romney thanked Bush for his endorsement.
The 43rd president, who has been exiled to political invisibility since leaving office, emerged on the campaign scene on Tuesday with a four-word endorsement of Romney. “I’m for Mitt Romney,” he told ABC News as the doors of an elevator closed on him following a speech he gave in Washington on human rights.
The Romney campaign offered no official press release of Bush’s support, signaling that the former president still carries too much baggage to help the current GOP candidate win voters.
The Obama campaign, on the other hand, jumped at the endorsement and tried to raise money off of it, asking supporters for donations. Obama’s team argues that Romney’s economic plan is the same as Bush’s plan.
The day after Bush’s impromptu plug, Romney didn’t mention the former president’s name once on the stump, even as he referred repeatedly to President Obama’s “predecessor.”
People close to Bush doubt that he is planning on campaigning with Romney. Bush’s brief public appearance on Tuesday was rare for an ex-president who, unlike Bill Clinton, has chosen to spend his post-presidential life in private.
US Government(WASHINGTON) -- ‘MEET THE RUBIOS’ In her first extended interview, Jeanette Rubio joined her husband Marco Rubio to discuss their family life with Politico and said that she is prepared for whatever scrutiny the couple may undergo as his national profile begins to rise.
“I’m prepared for the idea that no matter what he does — especially when there’s talk of him being the VP candidate — that [there] are things that are going to come out,” Jeanette Rubio told Politico. “And through the Senate campaign, we already went through a lot. … That really prepared us, or at least me.”
The interview shares the story of how they met, endured distance relationship in the age of no-Skype (Instead, Marco Rubio wrote long letters), and how they maintain a strong family in Florida while Marco Rubio works in D.C.
RUBIO WARNS OF ‘DAILY’ DEBT CEILING CRISIS: While Congress won’t have to vote on raising the debt ceiling until the end of the year, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., still warned that the country is facing a debt ceiling crisis “daily” and criticized Secretary Treasury Timothy Geithner’s suggestion that a debt ceiling crisis does not exist. We are having a debt ceiling crisis on a daily basis, and here’s why,” Rubio said in a FOX News interview Thursday. “Because this government every year is spending $1.5 trillion more than it takes in.” RUBIO ON VEEPSTAKES: “I’m curious to see who it’s going to be.” (Your World with Neil Cavuto, 5.17.12)
PAWLENTY NOW MUM ON VP PROSPECTS: Just days after he told reporters to “remove my name from the list,” former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty didn’t rule out that his name could appear on the GOP ticket this fall, but refused to speak about the “process,” which he attributed to being a tight-lipped policy of the Romney campaign. “We don’t talk about the vice presidential policy in terms of timing, whether it relates to me or anyone else or the aspects of that,” Pawlenty told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell. “That’s just the campaign’s policy. We don’t discuss the details of that process.”
RYAN AVOIDS VP TALK: During an editorial board meeting with the Washington Examiner, Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., deflected questions about whether he is being vetted by the Romney campaign. “I’m not gonna get into that. I’m not changing any of my answers. I get asked this every time I walk down the street. I’m not gonna give any new answers. I’ll let them comment about this. If I’m not gonna get into any of that. I’m not here to talk about that,” Ryan said according to a transcript of the meeting.
CONDI: ‘I DON’T REALLY LOVE POLITICS’ Condoleezza Rice again said she will not be Mitt Romney’s running mate, saying she doesn’t really have that loving feeling for politics. “Not going to happen,” she said. “I love policy, I don’t really love politics,” Rice said at a speech in Chicago Thursday. “One can do a lot with policy not in Washington.”
IS THUNE OUT? The Hill’s Alexander Bolton reports Friday that Mitt Romney’s VP vetting team has started reaching out to potential VP candidates, according to a source close to the campaign. The Hill directly asked four potential contenders if they had been contacted by the campaign. Sen. Rob Portman, Sen. Marco Rubio, and Rep. Paul Ryan each declined to answer the question, but Sen. John Thune, who falls on some VP speculation lists, said the campaign had not reached out to him at all.
PORTMAN TALKS REV. WRIGHT ATTACK AD: ABC News’ Gregory Simmons directs us to the Ohio News Network, which reports Sen. Rob Portman warned the Romney campaign and supporters to stay clear of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright attack ad on Obama. “I just think it’s a time for us to figure out how to come together as a country to solve these big problems,” Portman said, according to ONN. “The person who can show leadership on the economy is the person who folks are going to support as the next president.”
McDONNELL WEIGHS IN ON N.C. RACE: Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, who also serves as the chairman of the RGA, stood beside Republican Pat McCrory, who is running for governor of North Carolina, Thursday as he talked about the importance of the N.C. race, the Charlotte Observer reports. “Whatever we need to do to help Pat win, we will do,” McDonnell said as the two toured a Coca-Cola plant in Charlotte. “We rank this as one of the absolute top races in the country.”
VEEP TWEETS
@robportman Let’s take time during National Police Week to thank the brave service of our policemen and women dedicated to keeping us safe
@bobmcdonnell I’m pleased to endorse @PatMcCroryNC for North Carolina governor today in Charlotte http://yfrog.com/ghnij
@GovChristie .@GarySinise Great piece on @60Minutes showcasing all your inspiring work with our wounded warriors. When’s the Lt. Dan Band playing Jersey?
@KellyAyotte Talking w students from Iber Holmes Gove Middle School visiting DC from Raymond, #NH http://pic.twitter.com/Pl4mNImM
@nikkihaley R.I.P. Donna Summer who died in Florida today of cancer. She was awesome! My favorite of hers was “On the Radio”.
JEWEL SAMAD/AFP/Getty Images(WEST PALM BEACH, Fla.) -- The Mitt Romney campaign released on Friday its first ad of the General Election, a 30-second spot that focuses on what the candidate would do on the first day in the White House.
The ad, which according to reports is set to run in several battleground states such as Iowa, Ohio, North Carolina and Virginia is titled, “Day One,” and was first released early Friday morning by Romney’s campaign manager Matt Rhoades in an e-mail to “trusted supporters.” The campaign also released an identical ad in Spanish, titled “Dia Uno.”
The spot begins with a voiceover asking, “What would a Romney Presidency be like?” as text reading “Day 1″ flashes on the screen.
“President Romney immediately approves the Keystone pipeline, creating thousands of jobs that Obama blocked,” says the voiceover.
“President Romney introduces tax cuts and reforms that reward job creators, not punish them,” says the voiceover, as video of Romney speaking at various campaign events across the country plays. “President Romney issues order to begin replacing Obamacare with commonsense health care reform.”
“That’s what a Romney Presidency will be like,” the ad concludes.
Romney anticipated the upcoming ad on Thursday, telling the press that the ad would be a “positive ad on what I would do if I were president,” using it to juxtapose himself with President Obama.
“It’ll be contrasting with the president’s ad, which again is a character assassination ad,” Romney said, referring to an ad released by the Obama reelection campaign that focuses on his time at Bain Capital.
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) -- What began as the resurrection of one of the most animated characters in the 2008 campaign on Thursday ended with Mitt Romney being forced to answer to reporters and consequently offer up a flub of an answer on whether he supports negative ads.
After a leaked super PAC proposal to make ads about President Obama’s former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Romney tried to distance himself from the document, saying it was the “wrong course.”
But a reporter noted that in February, Romney brought up Wright unprompted in an interview -- a clip that Democrats unearthed early in the day.
In the clip, after a sound bite of Obama saying “Whatever we once were, we are no longer a Christian nation” was played, Romney said he believed Obama didn’t understand “that Judeo Christian philosophy is an integral part of our foundation.”
“I’m not sure which is worse: him listening to Rev. Wright or him saying we must be a less-Christian nation,” Romney said.
Romney’s explanation on Thursday fit right into a frame opponents have tried to put around him -- that he doesn’t know what he supports and what he opposes.
“I’m not familiar with precisely what I said, but I stand by what I said, whatever it was,” Romney said Thursday. “I’ll go back and take a look at what was said there.”
The Obama campaign was, predictably, all over Romney’s stumble.
“Today, Mitt Romney had the opportunity to distance himself from his previous attempts to inject the divisive politics of character assassination into the presidential race,” read a statement from Obama campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt. “It was a moment that required moral leadership, and once again he didn’t rise to the occasion.”
The proposal to revive the inflammatory pastor in 2012 ads is likely to end at just that: a proposal and nothing more. A person familiar with the super PAC told ABC News that no plan had been made to make any ads. Making the ads appears even less likely now that the idea has drawn condemnation from the Obama campaign and Romney himself.
Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy(WASHINGTON) -- In the wake of JPMorgan Chase’s staggering trading loss, President Obama is urging Republicans to “keep moving forward” and finish implementing Wall Street reform.
