Here & Now

President Obama Makes Campaign Stop in Madison

Zac Schultz:

President Barack Obama was looking for a friendly face Thursday and found 30,000 of them on Bascom Hill. His smiles and relaxed demeanor were in contrast to his body language Wednesday night at the first presidential debate in Denver.

Mitt Romney:

Virtually everything he just said about my tax plan is inaccurate.

Zac Schultz:

Mitt Romney was more aggressive, and Obama’s own campaign staff said the president was not prepared for what Romney was about to say. Ted Kanavas is a former state senator and the Romney campaign’s chairman in Wisconsin.

Ted Kanavas:

Governor Romney showed that he was clearly in control of that debate, he’s in control of where he wants to take the country, and he had a vision for the nation he shared.

Zac Schultz:

The president used this rally as an extension of the debate, rebutting a number of Mitt Romney’s statements from Wednesday night.

Barack Obama:

Some of you may have heard last night we had our first debate.

Zac Schultz:

Obama first went after Romney’s debate claim that his plans for a 20% cut to the income tax would not impact the middle class or the deficit.

Mitt Romney:

So if the tax plan he described were a tax plan I was asked to support I would say absolutely not. I’m not looking for a $5 trillion tax cut. What I’ve said it I won’t put in place a tax cut that adds to the deficit.

Barack Obama:

When I got of the stage I met this very spirited fellow who claimed to be Mitt Romney. But I know it couldn’t have been Mitt Romney, because the real Mitt Romney has been running around the country for the last year promising $5 trillion in tax cuts that favor the wealthy, and yet the fellow on the stage last night, who looked like Mitt Romney, said he did not know anything about that.

Zac Schultz:

Obama next went after perhaps Romney’s most talked-about statement of the debate.

Mitt Romney:

I’m going to stop the subsidy to PBS. I’m going to stop other things. I like PBS. I love big bird. I actually like you too. But I’m not going to keep on spending money to things to borrow money from China to pay for it.

Barack Obama:

But I just want to make sure I got this straight. He’ll get rid of regulations on Wall Street, but he’s going to crack down on Sesame Street.

Zac Schultz:

While Madison served as safe territory after the debate, the rally was also a reminder of Wisconsin’s importance in the race.

Ted Kanavas:

You don’t go into states that are already put away. You go into states that are battlegrounds. And that’s exactly what Wisconsin is.

Zac Schultz:

This was the president’s second visit to Wisconsin in less than two weeks. Mitt Romney hasn’t been here since August, but his campaign says we’ll see him shortly in an effort to capitalize on his success in the first debate.