ICYMI: Romney Profited From Government Handouts
This morning, the Los Angeles Times reported on Mitt Romney's reliance on tax breaks and government subsidies while working in private equity. The article focuses on Steel Dynamics, the same steel company featured in Romney's positive ad released just this morning, and all of the government help they received. In fact, Dekalb County was forced to institute a new tax to pay for all of the handouts. Despite his constant opposition to government interference in the free market, Mitt Romney has a long history of profiting from government handouts. Research after the jump.
LA Times: Mitt Romney No Stranger To Tax Breaks, Subsidies
On January 12, 2012, the Los Angeles Times reported:
As Mitt Romney defends his record running a private equity firm, he frequently points to a fast-growing Indiana steel company, financed in part by Bain Capital, that now employs 6,000 workers. What Romney doesn't mention is that Steel Dynamics also received generous tax breaks and other subsidies provided by the state of Indiana and the residents of DeKalb County, where the company's first mill was built. The story of Bain and Steel Dynamics illustrates how Romney, during his business career, made avid use of public-private partnerships, something that many conservatives consider to be "corporate welfare." It is a commitment that carried over into his term as governor of Massachusetts, when he offered similar incentives to lure businesses to his state.
Real Clear Politics: Romney's Tough Final Day In New Hampshire
On Janury 10, 2012, Real Clear Politics reported:
Romney's troubles began early in the morning when he told a crowd in Nashua, "I like being able to fire people who provide services to me." [...] The Democratic group American Bridge issued a research document hitting Romney with a more substantive question based on the heart of his remark -- firing a service that isn’t performing well. “Why did he refuse to fire the landscaping company he employed to take care of his lawn even after he found out they hired illegal immigrants to care for his property?” the group asked. “He waited until he was running for office (for Pete's sake!) to do something about it.”
BuzzFeed: 11 Newt Gingrich Tweets That Should Exist, But Don't
On January 6, 2012, BuzzFeed reported:
It's hardly a secret that Newt Gingrich is furious with Mitt Romney after pro-Romney groups spent millions attacking is character in Iowa. And while Gingrich hasn't shied away from going on the offensive, the pro-Obama SuperPAC American Bridge doesn't think he's quite gone far enough yet. They sent along these 11 tweets for Gingrich to send to get his campaign back from the dumps.
MEMO: Candidate Romney’s Attack Boomerangs On Governor Romney
Mitt Romney today has adopted the message of former Tea Party candidate Michele Bachmann in a transparent attempt to appeal to her extremist supporters. Romney’s phony outrage about “crony capitalism” is particularly surprising considering Romney’s record in Massachusetts. When Romney was Governor of Massachusetts, “the state handed out $4.5 million in loans to two firms run by his campaign donors that have since defaulted, leaving taxpayers holding the bag.” Romney lured one of the companies to Massachusetts by offering a direct loan from the state and his Administration bragged about using government loans to attract business. But, now that Romney is running for President, he claims that government loans to private companies are “crony capitalism.” It’s the worst kind of hypocrisy from a candidate who has proven he will do or say anything to advance his political career.
Romney’s Freddie Mac Attack on Gingrich Reeks of Hypocrisy
Washington, DC – Mitt Romney’s struggling presidential campaign is on the attack against former Speaker Newt Gingrich over a consulting contract with Freddie Mac. While desperate attacks have been a pillar of Romney’s long, 17-year political career, this week’s iteration is even more hypocritical than we've come to expect from Romney. As the Boston Globe reported, Romney himself has up to $500,000 in a mutual fund that is heavily invested Fannie & Freddie -- outside of his blind trust. The investment was made in late 2007, just “around the time that the scale of the housing crisis was coming into focus.”
VIDEO: Romney's Washington Examiner Editorial Board Interview – Best Of
Last week, Mitt Romney spoke at length with the editorial board of the Washington Examiner. American Bridge compiled a video of the best moments. Take a look.
VIDEO: Will Romney Run From His '07 RJC Speech?
On December 7, Mitt Romney is addressing the Republican Jewish Coalition's Republican Presidential Candidates Forum in Washington, DC. When addressing the same group during his last run for the White House in 2007, Romney lauded his health care plan and insinuated it should be a model for national health care reform (as he has done on numerous occasions). Will he say the same thing this year?
Mediaite: Wait, What? OJ Simpson Featured In New Anti Mitt Romney Ad
On December 2, 2011, Mediaite reported:
With the ascension of Newt Gingrich to the top of the GOP presidential field, perennial silver medalistMitt Romney has recently sought to contrast himself with the former House Speaker by casting himself as a political outsider, resurrecting a long-running theme. A new ad from American Bridge PAC torpedoes that notion, in hilarious fashion, with a Proustian collection of clips from the start of Romney’s political career, including that iconic slow-speed chase.
Mitt Romney’s 1994 – The Year His Career In Politics Began
1994… The Internet was coming to age. Courtney Cox and David Schwimmer debuted the first episode of Friends. O.J. Simpson led America on a slow, winding “chase” to infamy. I got my first car (’84 Chevette). And Mitt Romney -- the man now calling Newt Gingrich a “career politician” -- was beginning his 17-year career in national politics. It’s a tactic Romney has perfected over his two decades running for office: Regardless of the circumstances, painting himself as the political outsider and his opponent as a career politician. The irony is not just the long time Romney has spent in politics, but how he embodies the characteristics of a ‘career politicians’ he claims to be so eager to defeat. He has opportunistically changed on core beliefs so frequently, the conservative Manchester Union Leader wrote that Romney just “tells us what he thinks we want to hear.” But, to court (and win) support from the Republican establishment in Washington and on Wall Street, Romney has continued his pattern of pandering. Even the food he eats and the airlines he flies feel calculated by his chief pollster and strategist.