HILLIARD, Ohio -- At his first campaign event since the release of the final jobs report before Election Day, President Barack Obama reprised his auto-centric Ohio economic pitch, slamming Mitt Romney for what he said were deceptive ads claiming Jeep was moving its business overseas.
He suggested that such a claim, debunked by both Chrysler executives and multiple fact-checkers, made workers here unnecessarily fearful for their jobs.
“You've got folks who work at the Jeep plant who've been calling their employers, worried. Asking, is it true? Are our jobs being shipped to China? And the reason they're making these calls is because Governor Romney's been running an ad that says so,” Obama said, speaking to 2,800 supporters at the Franklin County Fairgrounds here.
“Everybody knows it’s not true,” he continued. “The car companies themselves had told Gov. Romney to knock it off.”
Recommended: Ryan lambastes jobs report: 'We are 9 million jobs short'
He said Romney was trying to cause such controversy as a last-ditch attempt to gloss over his opposition to the auto bailout, to the detriment of workers here.
“I understand that Gov. Romney's had a tough time here in Ohio because he was against saving the auto industry," Obama said, "and it's hard to run away from that position when you're on videotape saying the words ‘let Detroit go bankrupt.’”
He concluded, “You don't scare hardworking Americans just to scare up some votes."
This sort of populist appeal to auto- and other blue-collar workers has paid dividends for Obama in Rust Belt states like Ohio. He’s faring better among white working-class males in those states than he is with that group in the rest of the country.
Obama spent less time here talking about the latest 7.9 percent unemployment figure, touting the fact that companies hired more workers in October than at any time in the past eight months but quickly moving on.
He continued his tour through smaller Ohio towns, stopping next in Springfield, Ohio.