The Obama campaign is attempting to shift the focus of the campaign away from a gaffe by President Obama on the private sector, and back to Mitt Romney this week.
On Monday, David Axelrod, a senior advisor to Obama, brushed off claims that Obama’s “the private sector is doing fine” comment would have a broader impact on the campaign.
“Oh, that again?” Axelrod quipped on CBS’s This Morning. “In the minds of most Americans, there's no confusion about this.”
Axelrod then switched gears, hitting Romney on comments he made on Friday, when Romney attacked the president on wanting to add more jobs to the federal government, instead of focusing on the private sector. "He wants to hire more government workers," Romney said. "He says we need more firemen, more policeman, more teachers. Did he not get the message of Wisconsin?”
Said Axelrod: “Governor Romney reaction was we don't need teachers. We've lost thousands of teachers in the last 27 months as we were gaining these private sector jobs. Does anybody really believe that we don't need more teachers, that we can keep whacking teachers and we're going to advance as a country? That's a serious debate worth having.”
The Obama campaign on Monday released a new online video that slams Romney on his comments, saying he cut local government jobs when he was governor of Massachusetts. “It’s the same thing he did in Massachusetts,” the video says.
On CNN's Starting Point, Obama campaign deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter echoed Axelrod on Monday, saying Romney's solution to strengthening the economy was to "fire more people."
Obama’s private sector gaffe, however, remains a headache for the campaign. The Republican National Committee and the Romney campaign are not letting go, as Team Romney released yet another Web ad on Monday morning.
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