YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio â€" Representative Paul D. Ryan, seizing on new ammunition Saturday with which to attack President Obama on his stance toward China, criticized his administration delaying a report on currency manipulation that was due to be released next week.
In his first solo appearance since Thursday's vice-presidential debate, Mr. Ryan, Mitt Romney's running mate, focused attention on the issue as he appealed to voters in a Democratic-leaning corner of this state. He argued that Mr. Obama was giving China a free pass as manufacturing communities at home continued to suffer.
Mr. Romney has vowed to declare China a currency manipulator on his first day in office - a move Mr. Ryan criticized the p resident for not taking in the nearly four years he has been in the White House.
“The administration had their eighth chance to label China a currency manipulator,†Mr. Ryan told supporters at Youngstown State University, referring to the report. “It's due in two days. They say they're going to push this deadline off until after the election. That's eight opportunities they had to say, ‘You know what? Play fair with us. Trade with us fairly.' â€
The Treasury Department announced on Friday that it would delay the release of its twice-yearly report on foreign exchange rates until after a meeting next month of finance ministers and central bank governors from the Group of 20 nations.
The reports are often delayed. But Mr. Ryan said the Obama administration needed to more directly confront China for holding down the value of its currency in order to gain an advantage in international trade, and he said the latest postponem ent reflected Mr. Obama's “insistence on ignoring these problems.â€
The United States has not cited China as a currency manipulator, a designation that could lead to retaliatory tariffs, since 1994. Mr. Ryan argued that American jobs had been lost because the Obama administration had not taken a tougher approach, and accused it of allowing China to trample on American intellectual property rights.
“Taking our patents, taking our goods that we make and copying them and selling them: that's not correct, that's not right,†Mr. Ryan said. “That's cheating. And you know what? We're going to do something about it.â€
Mr. Ryan invoked China as he offered a broader critique of Mr. Obama's economic policies, arguing that the president had not done enough to protect American manufacturing jobs. Mr. Obama won this area in northeast Ohio by a wide margin in 2008, as did Senator John Kerry and Vice President Al Gore before him, but the Romney campaign is hoping that Democratic voters will defect this year in large part over their frustration with the economy.
The Obama campaign, which has accused Mr. Romney of condoning the outsourcing of jobs to China during his private-equity career, suggested that Mr. Ryan's attacks lacked credibility because of his running mate's business dealings.
“Congressman Ryan's tough rhetoric can't hide the fact that Mitt Romney will never crack down on China's cheating - just look at his record,†a spokesman for the Obama campaign, Danny Kanner, said in a statement.
