Election 2012 Archives | Innovation Ohio

Oct 31 2012

Romney, Kasich Lie About Auto Rescue

News Release For Immediate Release: October 10, 2012 Contact: Dale Butland, 614-783-5833

ROMNEY, KASICH LIE ABOUT AUTO RESCUE IO; Auto Czar Rattner Say Jobs & China Claims are “Cynical Deceptions”

COLUMBUS — Steven Rattner joined Innovation Ohio today at a Columbus news conference to “blow the whistle on the Romney campaign’s cynical attempt to mislead Ohio voters about the auto rescue.” Rattner was Lead Advisor to President Obama during the 2009 rescue of the auto industry. Innovation Ohio is a progressive think tank headquartered in Columbus. Rattner and IO cited numerous instances in which the Romney campaign and its GOP allies – including Ohio Gov. John Kasich – have attempted to mislead Ohio voters, including:

At an October 25 campaign rally in Defiance, Romney claimed that “Jeep is thinking of moving all production to China.” The company emphatically denied the charge the same day, saying “Jeep has no intention of shifting production out of North America” and criticizing Romney’s claim in unusually blunt language as “a leap that would be difficult even for circus acrobats” and lamenting “unnecessary fantasies and extravagant comments.” In fact, Jeep intends to restart production in China by hiring additional workers, not moving U.S. jobs there. It’s akin to Honda or Toyota opening plants here to build cars for the American market.
Despite the company’s rebuke, on October 27 the Romney campaign began airing a television ad misleadingly saying that “Obama … sold Chrysler to Italians who are going to build Jeeps in China.” The ad also contains three additional distortions:
- It states that Obama “took the auto companies through bankruptcy” — conveniently omitting that was Romney’s plan as well;
- It says that the conservative-leaning Detroit News “endorsed Romney” — conveniently omitting that the endorsement criticized his position on the auto rescue, while praising Obama’s “extraordinary leadership” on the issue.
- It states that Romney has a “plan to help the auto industry” — when neither he nor his campaign has ever announced or spelled out such a plan.
- As a result, the ad has been rated false by numerous media fact-checkers, including the Tampa Tribune’s “Politifact” which rated it “Pants On Fire.”
On October 28, in an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press”, Gov. Kasich that Ohio is only “up a total of 400 auto jobs when you count the companies and suppliers.” In fact, Innovation Ohio has shown that the industry has created over 17,300 Ohio jobs since the rescue. And according to the Kasich Administration’s own Department of Development, 34% of private investment in 2011 – including 11 of 29 investments over $50 million — were in the auto industry. These deals accounted for 18% of all private sector job announcements reported by the Department.
On October 30, the Romney campaign tripled down on its deceit with a radio ad which not only repeats the debunked claim about Chrysler shipping American jobs to China, but claims that GM is planning to do so too. The ad also falsely blames President Obama for GM “cutting 15,000 American jobs.” In truth, these losses occurred prior to the President’s rescue plan in the summer of 2009. Since then, more than 152,000 American auto jobs have been created.

In the final Presidential debate and since, Gov. Romney implied that he actually favored using federal money to save the auto industry. In fact, he opposed both the essential “bridge loans” provided by President G.W. Bush and the long-term funding provided by President Obama. He would only consider federal guarantees of private sector financing following a bankruptcy proceeding. But there would have been nothing to “guarantee” because the auto companies were out of cash, private sector financing was not available, and without the funding provided by President Obama, the companies would never have come out of bankruptcy. Instead, they would have ceased paying suppliers, laid off their employees, closed their doors and liquidated. Said Innovation Ohio President Janetta King: “President Obama took an enormous risk when he bet on Ohio and Ohio workers. But the President’s bet paid off — and now over 17,000 Ohioans are back at work in the auto industry and Ohio’s unemployment rate is lower than it’s been since 2008. But if Romney, Kasich and Mandel had their way, Ohio wouldn’t have an auto industry today.” Added IO communications director Dale Butland: “It was bad enough when Mitt Romney turned his back on Ohio workers by opposing the auto rescue and saying ‘Let Detroit Go Bankrupt.’ But now he’s adding insult to injury by distorting what happened and running false and misleading television and radio ads. Equally shameful is that Gov. Kasich is assisting Mr. Romney in that deception. Trying to win an election is one thing. Trying to win it this way is something else again. If Gov. Romney will lie to Ohioans about auto jobs, maybe we should ask what else he’s been lying about.” Materials distributed at IO’s press conference can be found here. -30-

Oct 31 2012

2011 Ohio Auto Industry Investments

Investements in the Ohio Auto Industry in 2011

Oct 29 2012

Romney Campaign’s Assault on the Truth of the Auto Bailout – IO Answers

An op-ed piece co-authored by IO’s Janetta King and Tom Perriello of the Center for American Progress is running in the The Plain Dealer today. It clearly answers the question: “Who is right on the auto rescue debate raging in Ohio?” Poised on either side of the debate are President Barack Obama and Gov. Mitt Romney (Romney, aided and abetted by Ohio Gov. John Kasich). The answer to the question is: The President. From the op-ed: [Read more…]

Oct 12 2012

Veep Debate Fact Check: Did the Stimulus Help?

V.P. candidate Rep. Paul Ryan made pointed comments Thursday night about the stimulus bill championed by President Obama shortly after taking office and passed by the then-Democratic led Congress. Ryan is correct in saying that the unemployment rate languished above 8% – above Obama’s target – for longer than the Administration expected. However, the charge that he and other Republicans level that the stimulus was inconsequential is false. Here’s what the New York Times fact checkers had to say about the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act:

The 18-month recession officially ended in June 2009, five months into Mr. Obama’s term, as measured by the National Bureau of Economic Research. There is plenty of debate over how effective Mr. Obama’s economic policies have been, especially given the painfully slow recovery. But even critics who believe that the president’s stimulus law was a missed opportunity — from liberals who say it was too small to conservatives who say it was wasteful and poorly targeted — tend to acknowledge what the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has found: that it did save or create jobs, lower the unemployment rate and help the economy grow in the short term. The budget office used ranges to estimate the impact of stimulus. At its peak in the third quarter of 2010, the budget office found, the stimulus saved or created the equivalent of between one million and 5.1 million full-time jobs, lowered the unemployment rate by between 0.4 and two percentage points, and increased the real gross domestic product by between 0.7 percent and 4.1 percent.

Reasonable people may disagree on the size of the stimulus and where and how investments were made, but it made a difference. In fact, in our recent report done with the Center for American Progress, we identified several stimulus items that continue to help the middle class today. The American Opportunity Tax Credit is used to help families afford college education and the expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit helps keep lower income Americans in the workforce. The Romney-Ryan budget plans call for scaling back of these items, while cutting taxes for the wealthy by 20%.

Oct 10 2012

Kasich Budget Cuts = More School Levies

News Release For Immediate Release: October 10, 2012 Contact: Dale Butland, 614-783-5833

KASICH BUDGET CUTS = MORE SCHOOL LEVIES IO SAYS 83% OF OHIO COUNTIES ASKING FOR “NEW MONEY”

Columbus — Innovation Ohio, a progressive think tank headquartered in Columbus, today released an analysis which finds that 62 of Ohio’s 88 counties (83%) will have school levies requesting “new money” on the November, 2012 ballot. All told, 194 school levies will be on the fall ballot, 124 of which are requests for new money. The rest are renewals of existing levies. The analysis found that the number of new money requests is the highest since November, 2008 when just over 40% were passed by the voters. The passage rates of new money requests have been falling in recent years, with just 22% passing in November 2010 and 28% passing in November, 2011. New money requests have become more prolific since Gov. Kasich and his legislative allies cut $1.8 billion from school districts in the state’s current two year budget. [Read more…]

Oct 08 2012

Early, in-person voting especially important to Ohio’s African-American community

Under the headline: Analysis of Cuyahoga County voting finds cutback on in-person balloting hits minorities most a story over the weekend by The Plain Dealer’s Tom Feran provides more confirmation that GOP efforts in battleground states to tighten restrictions on when and how we vote are part of a larger strategy to keep Democrats away from the polls. We showed you earlier that Democrats are more likely to vote early and we also just released a report that puts Ohio into the context of wider-ranging right-wing efforts to suppress the vote during this presidential election season. What the analysis described by The Plain Dealer tells us is that there is solid evidence that Republicans stand to gain by restricting early voting in-person before Election Day because it interferes with a traditional way by which many African-Americans vote. From Feran’s article: [Read more…]

Oct 04 2012

The Day After: There’s Still a $5 Trillion Hole in Romney-Ryan Plan

If you’re tuned in to the ongoing presidential election race, you might have still been scratching your head this morning given Gov. Mitt Romney’s performance in last night’s debate versus President Barack Obama. There’s no confusion over the perceived winner. In our style-first culture, Romney won last night hands down. His answers were sharper, shorter and more pointed than the president’s. He smiled a lot – although that smile was called smug by some, confident by others. Romney looked and sounded great. But, we’re not hiring a Ken doll, we’re deciding on the near term future of the entire country. [Read more…]

Sep 27 2012

Ohio’s auto industry has added 17,315 jobs since rescue latest data say

The importance of Ohio’s auto industry to the state’s economy is underscored once again today as the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics quarterly census of employment and wage data shows 17,315 jobs added since the federal rescue. This being a political season – and the auto rescue being a political football – there has been much back and forth about just how much effect the rescue has had. Take a look at the chart below. The IO research staff has compiled and tracked the BLS since our first report on the importance of the auto rescue earlier this year. We look at the “direct jobs” in the ‘auto cluster’ in the following North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) groups:

NAICS 336100 Motor Vehicle Manufacturing
NAICS 336200 Motor Vehicle Body and Trailer Manufacturing
NAICS 336300 Motor Vehicle Parts Manufacturing

GOP partisans are responsible for the confusion about auto industry job creation in Ohio since the rescue. Gov. John Kasich has purposefully low-balled the number as has the Columbus Dispatch. Here’s as unvarnished as we can make the truth:

Sep 27 2012

IO Report shows why Romney needs to “reboot” his policies

There’s a story in the New York Times describing yet another reboot of the Romney for President campaign. We’ll call this reboot, the compassionate Romney.

Compassionate Romney speaks into a camera for 60 seconds and tells you it’s hard out there, he knows it, and, well, he cares. Then it’s blame Obama and ends with “my plan will work.” This tear-jerker comes ten days after the 47% video in which he dispassionately tells a roomful of power wigs half the country are shirkers and he’s written them off. This reboot should go into the file marked: “Will say anything to get elected.” What this more tender Mitt Romney is saying doesn’t square with the policy proposals he’s brought forth as his surefire plan. Here’s what we know of the Romney-Ryan Plan:

Tax cuts for the wealthy
Paid for by effectively raising taxes on the middle class, elderly and working poor

IO worked with the Center for American Progress on a recent report: The Real Cost of the Romney-Ryan Plan to Ohioans. Here are some key takeaways from the report:

Millionaires in Ohio would receive around $87,000 in tax cuts under Romney-Ryan. To help pay for that, the currently untaxed health coverage that 6 million families in Ohio receive from their employers would be taxed. The bill per year, per family would range from $1,000 to $1,900. The mortgage deduction would also take a hit, nailing middle income earners. Taxes on mortgages would increase over $1,000 per family.
Working families and single parents struggling to balance work and childcare would get hit by Romney Economics. Currently, 158,000 families claim the child care tax credit. Romney’s plan is to reduce that credit by 58%. This would cost each of those families in Ohio $318 more per year for child care through the increase in taxes. Helping lower income workers with child care through this tax credit is an incentive to work.
1.6 million lower income working families in Ohio qualify for the Earned Income Tax Credit and the refundable portion of the child tax credit. Both of these credits were improved in the Obama Stimulus in 2009. Romney’s plan calls for rolling back those improvements which would cost these Ohio working families about $876 each per year.

There’s so much more – read the report linked above. The point is high rollers win, most people lose in Ohio under Romney Economics. We’ve looked at the numbers in Ohio, but given that these are federal policies, middle class and lower income workers are clobbered from sea to shining sea by the Romney-Ryan plan. Don’t get fooled by gauzy campaign ads — Romney may reboot his message, but he hasn’t rebooted his budget and tax priorities.