Romney: Obama Guilty of 'Vicious Lies' Regarding Bain Capital

By Jon E. Dougherty at 3 Jul 2012

(Newsroom America) -- Mitt Romney on Monday accused President Obama of engaging in "vicious lies" in an new TV ad regarding the presumptive GOP presidential nominee's time at private equity firm, using a familiar Democratic voice and a Washington Post column as ammunition.

The ad, which is currently airing only in the swing state of Ohio, features one-time presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton, who chided Obama during the 2008 Democratic primaries, "Shame on you, Barack Obama!"

Clinton, during the bitterly contested nomination process, was accusing Obama of "millions of dollars perpetuating falsehoods." After Obama took office, he named Clinton his secretary of state.

"But that's Barack Obama," a narrator then intones, before going onto say Obama attacked Clinton throughout with "vicious lies."

The ad goes onto a Washington Post editorial, which called Obama's attacks on Romney's Bain record "misleading, unfair, and untrue."

The ad is the Romney campaign's latest effort to refute a key message in the president's reelection effort: that the former Massachusetts governor is not the best candidate to turn the economy around and spur job creation.

Throughout the campaign cycle thus far, Obama has accused Romney directly, and Bain Capital by default, of taking over companies, eliminating those jobs and allowing many to then be shipped overseas, claims Romney vehemently denies and which a number of others - some who are political allies with the president - also refute.

The Post column refuted an Obama campaign ad accusing Bain and Romney of outsourcing American jobs during the candidate's 15 years with the firm.

But the Obama ads relied on a previous Post article which said "that six companies that Bain invested in during Romney’s tenure at the firm were 'pioneers' in the emerging trend of outsourcing U.S. jobs to foreign countries like India and China," Fox News reported.

In turn, the Romney campaign solicited statements from the six firms' current and former CEOs, each of which said they had added U.S. jobs during their association with Romney and Bain.

The also noted that their support of foreign call centers was in direct support of foreign exports of U.S. goods.

FactCheck.org also examined the Obama ad's accusations, concluding that "we found no evidence to support the claim that Romney -- while he was still running Bain Capital -- shipped American jobs overseas."

An Obama campaign spokesman responded that FactCheck.org "did get this one wrong," the report said.

"What the Romney campaign and others have tried to do is to extract Mitt Romney from his tenure at Bain," Ben LaBolt said. "Some of these jobs were shipped overseas after 1999, but the fact is that Romney remained CEO and sole owner of Bain Capital through 2001."

Newsroom America Twitter Feed