Obama Surrogates on the Road to Tout Auto Rescue

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

COLUMBUS, Ohio – The Obama for America Campaign has taken to the roads of the Buckeye State with its “Made in Ohio” auto tour that starts today

It is part of an effort to shore up support for the president by touting his decision to rescue the domestic auto industry.

Former Gov. Ted Strickland, a co-chairman of the Obama for America campaign, joined United Autoworkers President Bob King and Lordstown autoworker Dawn Burkey in a conference call with reporters Monday to announce the tour.

“Although the polls, pundits and prominent Republicans like Mitt Romney advised against it, the president made the right decision to step in and allow the companies to restructure,” Strickland said. “What a lot of people may not know is the real stories.”

The Obama campaign is gearing up now that Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts, is the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee for president.

The campaign tour will take Obama surrogates to communities heavily reliant on the auto industry as for their livelihoods. Among them are Warren, Perrysburg and Akron, where the surrogates can talk to workers whose lives have been affected by the president’s decision to use a federally assisted bankruptcy to save General Motors Co. and Chrysler Corp.

The restructuring effort received support even from competitors such as Honda and Toyota, Strickland said, whose livelihoods are tied to the same supply chains that support the domestic automakers.

“This was an action that obviously helped the Big Three, but I contend it was good for all auto producers and parts producers across the country,” Strickland stated.

The former governor added that one of every six automobiles in the country is produced in Ohio and while one job in eight in the state is tied to the industry.

“Every job is filled by a real person with a real story here in Ohio," said King. "Eighty out of 88 Ohio counties is home to at least one company associated with the auto industry.”

Burkey said that she has worked as a welder on the assembly line 15 years at GM's Lordstown plant. During the Great Recession, she was laid off eight months but returned once the Lordstown plant resumed production.

"Without President Obama’s brave decision, I believe the auto jobs in the Valley would never come back,” she said.

The road tour begins today, and each day’s itinerary will be announced the day before.