CNN’s Jim Acosta interviewed Romney yesterday in Ohio and aside from the overt bias of some of the questions, primarily the one about black Americans at the end, I thought Romney handled himself quite well.
My favorite part was when he was challenged by the reporter about his welfare ad being inaccurate. After Romney explained it was accurate, the reporter challenged him based on internet fact-checks and then Romney turned it right back on the reporter and asked him directly “Did he take the work requirement out of welfare?” The reporter answered noting what the Obama administration would say, that “they’re trying to give governors the flexibility to increase the amount of work that goes into receiving welfare benefits.” Romney then refuted it with ease:
No, no. No, no. You always have the capacity to add work. There’s never been a requirement that you can’t have more work. The requirement that they’re waiving was saying that people don’t have to work to get welfare. That’s the change that they proposed. I disagree with that direction. I think the president has also — I disagree with the direction on the work requirement as it related to food stamps. Look taking work requirements out of government assistance is in my opinion a very bad course to take and creates a culture of dependency. We help people who need help. We want to help people that need help. But the idea of removing work requirements I think is a mistake.
The last question in the interview was horrible:
“African-Americans have a tremendous sense of pride that there’s the first African-American president in the White House. If you were to somehow beat the first African-American president, what would you say to the black community to assure them that you would be their president also?“
Are you kidding me? Talk about a race-based divisive question. Romney answered it well, but I honestly wish he would have pulled a Newt on the reporter at that moment and slammed him for dividing Americans like that.
Watch the full interview: