•  Campaign Videos (June 2012) « Obama for America
  

Stephanie Cutter: Hi, I'm Stephanie Cutter, deputy campaign manager for President Obama.

Mitt Romney must think you're not paying attention to the facts in this election, 'cause there's no other way to explain his constant distortions about the president and his record.

In response to my previous videos you've told me, give us the facts and we'll get the president's back. 

So today we're going to debunk a bogus line about President Obama that the president himself called a cow pie of distortion in Iowa the other week.

Here's the false attack.  Romney's website says, "Federal spending has accelerated at a pace without precedent in recent history."

TEXT: "Federal spending has accelerated at a pace without precedent in recent history." —MittRomney.com 5/29/12

This is wrong, totally wrong. 

If fact the Washington Post's Eugene Robinson called it utterly false.  And then he said, "There are those who tell the truth.  There are those who distort the truth.  And then there's Mitt Romney."

TEXT: "There are those who tell the truth.  There are those who distort the truth.  And then there's Mitt Romney." —The Washington Post, 5/28/12

So I have three facts to give you so you can push back on this nonsense, and then some facts about Mitt Romney you may not know.

TEXT: 1. Spending has grown at the slowest rate of any President in over six decades.
CHART: Slowest Spending in Decades Under President Obama / Annualized Growth of Federal Spending
TEXT: "Obama spending binge never happened."  —MarketWatch, 5/22/12
TEXT: "Demolishes Romney's contention."  —PolitiFact.com, 5/23/12

First, spending under this president has grown at the slowest rate since the 1950s according to a recent column in the Wall Street Journal's "Market Watch."  It said, "Obama spending binge never happened."  The fact checkers at PolitiFact agreed and said that the math, and I quote, demolishes Romney's contention.

TEXT: 2. The President has signed into law spending cuts that eliminated programs that aren't working to reduce our deficit.
CHART: Discretionary spending now on a path to lowest level since Eisenhower administration

Second, the president has signed into law $2 trillion in deficit reduction which is part of his balanced plan to cut the deficit by more than $4 trillion.  Part of that is by eliminating programs that aren't working.  As a result annual domestic spending as a share of the economy is on track to reach its lowest level since President Eisenhower was in the White House.

TEXT: 3. The President has found new ways to cut waste in Washington.
TEXT: We've recovered $10.7 billion from health care fraud.  That includes a record of over $4 billion in 2011 alone.

Third, the president continues to work with Congree to reduce the deficit, but where they won't act, he will.  So by executive action, he's found new ways to cut waste in Washington.  In fact under his leadership we've cut over $20 billion in waste, fraud and abuse in programs like Medicare, Medicaid and the unemployment insurance.  We've recovered $10.7 billion in health care fraud, including a record $4 billion in 2011 alone.  And the president has ordered agencies to cut down their travel budgets by over 30-percent in order to ensure that we're using taxpayer dollars wisely.

So those are the facts about President Obama, but there's more.

TEXT: Mitt Romney would increase the nation's deficit by as much as $5 trillion.
TEXT: As governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney left a deficit of over $1 billion.  And increased the state's long-term debt by 16%.

Mitt Romney not only likes to distort our record, but he doesn't like to tell truth about his own.  His economic plan would increase the nation's deficit by as much as $5 trillion thanks mostly to tax cuts that favor millionaires and billionaires that he doesn't pay for.  An average tax cut of $250,000 per millionaire.  And as governor of Massachusetts, after promising to cut spending—just as he's promising to do now—he actually increased it every year he was in office.  He left his successor a deficit of over $1 billion and increased the state's long-term debt by 16-percent.

Mitt Romney doesn't seem to care about these facts, but I know you do, and so do your friends and family.  So let's get these facts out on Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr.  I'm so fired up about this one, I might even set up my own Tumblr to get this stuff out.

So thanks for having the president's back; let's set the record straight.

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Notes:

Copyright © 2012 Eric M. Appleman/Democracy in Action.