Clinton Assails Romney on Swing Through Ohio

PERRYSBURG, Ohio - Bill Clinton swept through a campaign visit to Ohio on behalf of President Obama on Thursday, blasting Mitt Romney and his surrogates for implying that Jeep might begin manufacturing vehicles in China at the expense of American jobs and for suggesting that Colin L. Powell endorsed Mr. Obama because both men are black.

Mr. Clinton, 66, started the day with a campaign stop in Wisconsin and made his first Ohio stop here, outside Toledo, his voice as hoarse as it often was 20 years ago when he campaigned for president. Much of his appearance was a reprise of his speech at the Democratic National Convention and other campaign talks that have praised Mr. Obama's economic, health care and student loan policies.

“My voice is a little weak,” he told a crowd of about 1,900 students and other supporters at Owens Community College. “But I wasted it in a good cause.”

In fact, the pace of his appearances for Mr. Obama was evident a few minute s into his speech when Mr. Clinton said, “I'm honored to be here in Pennsylvania to support President Obama.”

“Ohio!” many in the crowd shouted.

“I have a Pennsylvania line in the speech,” Mr. Clinton explained. But it was a forgiving crowd. “It's O.K,” one woman screamed. “Give ‘em hell, Bill,” a man shouted a few minutes later.

Mr. Clinton reveled in the opportunity to attack Mr. Romney over the Republican ticket's widely criticized commercial that left the misleading impression that Chrysler - the corporate parent of Jeep â€" would build Jeeps in China at the expense of American jobs. The automaker says it is discussing new Jeep production in China for sales within China, but that would not affect jobs in the United States, and that it is adding workers in Toledo. The Romney campaign has stood by the accuracy of the commercial.

“Mr. Romney has come into Ohio time and time again and tied himself in knots,” Mr. Clinton said. “So what's their latest scam? You've probably seen it - they say that Jeep is moving jobs to China.” Many in the crowd also shouted “China!” as Mr. Clinton said it, almost drowning his raspy voice.

“The truest thing the Romney campaign ever said was, they have no intention of having their campaign be dictated by fact-checkers,” Mr. Clinton added.

Mr. Clinton also took a shot at John H. Sununu, the former New Hampshire governor and one of Mr. Romney's chief surrogates, who last week had suggested that Mr. Powell, the former secretary of state under George W. Bush, may have endorsed Mr. Obama for a second time because they are both of the same race.

“Oh, he endorsed him because they are both black,” Mr. Clinton said, using his own paraphrase of Mr. Sununu's comments. (Mr. Sununu had quickly backtracked last week, saying he did not doubt Mr. Powell's endorsement was based on anything other than support for Mr. Obama's policies.)

And Mr. Clinton wasn't finished. He mentioned how the Romney campaign had, in Mr. Clinton's words, stated that “now the Italians are taking your jobs away.” (Chrysler is majority-owned by Fiat â€" the “Italians” â€" and the Romney commercial's voiceover had stated that Mr. Obama had “sold Chrysler to Italians who are going to build Jeeps in China. Mitt Romney will fight for every American job.” Text shown on the screen had also said, “Plans to return Jeep output to China.”)

Chrysler's chief executive, Sergio Marchionne, e-mailed his employees earlier this week to “unambiguously restate our position: Jeep production will not be moved from the United States to China,” adding that “it is inaccurate to suggest anything different.”

Mr. Clinton, who says he has Irish ancestry, closed his remarks here by joking, “Pretty soon, they'll come after the Irish â€" and I'm toast.”

The Early Word: Bloomberg

In Today's Times:

• Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York City reversed his plan not to back a candidate in the presidential race on Thursday, endorsing President Obama as the better option to take on climate change, which he said might have contributed to the violent storm that took the lives of at least 38 New Yorkers and caused billions of dollars in damage this week, Raymond Hernandez reports.

• With a close presidential race and a notable lack of trust between campaigns, thousands of lawyers are gearing up to monitor polling places on Tuesday, prepared to take legal action if need be, Ethan Bronner reports.

• Mr. Obama and Mitt Romney returned to the campaign trail in earnest on Thursday, offering their closing arguments as Mr. Obama emphasized a series of recent displays of bipartisanship and Mr. Romney strived to break away from the president in polls that show them virtually tied, Michael D. Shear and Mark Landler report.

• The nonpartisan research arm of the Library of Congress has taken back a report that challenged a central conservative economic theory - that there is a correlation between top tax rates and economic growth - after protests from Senate Republicans, who took issue with its findings and wording, Jonathan Weisman reports.

• David Axelrod has put up a tough fight in this campaign, a contrast to his stewardship of the idealism defining the president's 2008 campaign. Jim Rutenberg reports on the political strategist who has been with Mr. Obama since the Illinois State Senate.

Washington Happenings:

• The Labor Department releases the unemployment numbers for October on Friday morning, offering the last set of data on a closely watched barometer of economic well-being before Election Day.

• Mr. Obama makes a swing through Ohio with three campaign events there Friday.

Akin Finds Funding in Final Days of Senate Race

KANSAS CITY, Mo. â€" Representative Todd Akin, abandoned by the Republican establishment after his contentious comments on rape months ago, is receiving an influx of more than $2 million in the final days of his campaign against incumbent Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri.

Nearly a million of those dollars on television ad buys are coming from Mr. Akin's campaign, while the rest is from outside groups, and there is speculation that organizations that previously distanced themselves from the six-term Congressman could be behind some of the new spending.

The Missouri Republican Party coordinated with the Akin campaign for a $387,000 ad buy, a spokesman for Mr. Akin said, while the campaign itself made a $300,000 purchase two days ago. The spokesman, Rick Tyler, said the Akin campaign planned to make another $600,000 ad buy on Thursday.

Although Mr. Akin had only about $550,000 at the end of September, Mr. Tyler said the campaign had raised money from var ious sources since then. As of the middle of October, the Missouri Republican Party had $375,080 on hand, leading to some speculation that it may have received an outside cash infusion to help with the Akin ad buys.

It has raised the question of whether the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which may make large-sum transfers to state parties, was behind the funding. The committee had pledged millions of dollars to Mr. Akin before he made his infamous comments in August that victims of “legitimate rape” could fight off pregnancy. It withdrew its funding pledge and, while it maintained in recent weeks that it would not re-enter the race with money, it also said that it hoped Mr. Akin would win the race and it was monitoring the situation closely.

A spokesman for the committee did not respond to an e-mail seeking comment on Thursday.

One of Mr. Akin's television ads already was up on Thursday, and it featured a w oman who said she was a rape victim and another who said she was a Russian immigrant. The rape victim, identified as Kelly, said she was supporting Mr. Akin because “he defends the unborn. He's a kind man, a compassionate man. He has so much integrity.”

The Russian woman, Zoya, said that she has known the Akin family for 7 years and that Mr. Akin knew that the government's job was “to protect life, not control life like they did in Russia.”

In addition to the ad buys from the state party and his own campaign, Mr. Akin is getting a boost from the Now or Never PAC, which announced a $1 million ad buy on Wednesday, and a $550,000 purchase from Faith Family Freedom Fund. Now or Never's ad says, “You don't have to agree with everything he says, but you can be sure in the Senate Akin will vote for Romney's policies to get Americans working again.”

This influx of money came the same week that a new poll was released showing the race to be a dead heat.< /p>

Despite this late spending surge from Mr. Akin, his fund-raising has paled in comparison to that of Ms. McCaskill, who spent more than four and a half times as much as her opponent in the third quarter. In fact, Ms. McCaskill's campaign launched its own ad on Thursday using Mitt Romney to attack Mr. Akin.

“Is Todd Akin fit to serve in the Senate,” a moderator asks at the opening of the ad. “Mitt Romney doesn't think so.”

The ad then cuts to a clip of Mr. Romney speaking next to his running mate, Representative Paul D. Ryan.

“What he said was indefensible, was wrong, it was offensive and he should step out of the race,” Mr. Romney said.

Jobs Report Offers Little Change in Dynamic Between Obama and Romney

Economic Data Offers Little Change in Dynamic Between Obama and Romney

WASHINGTON - The jobs report on Friday had held the potential to inject an unpredictable, last-minute jolt into the race for the White House.

The Last Jobs Report Before the Election Close Video See More Videos '

Instead, somewhat stronger job growth than expected and a slight uptick in the unemployment rate seemed to offer little change in the dynamic between President Obama and his Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, as they enter the final weekend of an election already shaped by the changing contours of the nation's economy.

Economists had predicted the addition of about 125,000 jobs and said the unemployment rate, which had dropped to 7.8 percent in September, might rise slightly.

The report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics beat those expectations for job growth, showing the addition of 171,000 jobs in October. And the unemployment rate, which ticked up to 7.9 percent, remained below 8 percent.

Mr. Obama is likely to cite the report as further evidence that the nation's economy is continuing to recover slowly under his policies. The president argues that nearly three years of expansion in employer's payrolls has added almost five million jobs since the economic collapse in 2008 and 2009.

That the unemployment rate remains below 8 percent allows Mr. Obama and his supporters to argue that the economic improvement over the past several months is not a fluke and that the country is headed in the right direction.

The White House said the jobs report showed the “biggest monthly gain in eight months.” In a statement, Alan B. Krueger, the chairman of the president's Council of Economic Advisers, said it provided “further evidence that the U.S. economy is continuing to heal from the wounds inflicted by the worst downturn since the Great Depression.”

But the data did not provide the kind of unambiguous boost for the president that he received last month, when the unemployment rate dropped unexpectedly from 8.1 percent to 7.8 percent.

For Mr. Romney, the numbers offer little new ammunition. For months, he has hammered the president for presiding over an economy with unemployment over 8 percent. With Friday's report, the rate remains below that level for the second month in a row.

On the campaign trail in recent weeks, Mr. Romney has argued that the country's modest jobs growth is inadequate in the face of an economy that continues to struggle.

In a statement Friday morning, Mr. Romney said the jobs report was evidence of the need to change the nation's economic policies.

“Today's increase in the unemployment rate is a sad reminder that the economy is at a virtual standstill,” Mr. Romney said. “The jobless rate is higher than it was when President Obama took office, and there are still 23 million Americans struggling for work. On Tuesday, America will make a choice between stagnation and prosperity.”

In fact, there are about 12 million people unemployed in the country. Mr. Romney often says that there are 23 million people who are out of work, have stopped looking for work or are in part-time jobs when they want full-time work.

For economists, the new report is just one piece of evidence about how the economy is doing. But among voters, the unemployment rate remains one of the most recognized barometers of economic progress or retrenchment.

The jobs reports, usually released on the first Friday of every month, have become a regular feature of the 2012 presidential campaign. Political strategists in Boston and Chicago - where the two campaigns have their headquarters - nervously anticipated the impact of the report each month.

But none was anticipated more than the one on Friday. Coming just days before the end of the election, the report was viewed by some as a potential bombshell that might have helped sway undecided or uncertain voters in a race that polls suggest could be exceptionally close.

Still, the trajectory of the economic arguments by the candidates has been set for months, with even last month's unexpected improvement doing little to change the political dynamic in the race.

There is now little time for new television ads or rewritten stump speeches. And in many of the most important swing states, millions of people have already voted, diminishing any potential impact of Friday jobs report, the final one of the campaign.

From the Lens Blog: Catch the Shot or the Candidate?

Chris Kaufman/Chico Enterprise-Record/Associated Press

From our colleagues over on the Lens blog: On the campaign trail in 1996, Senator Bob Dole fell into a scrum of photographers - one broke the Republican candidate's fall, while the falling banister broke another one's foot. A third got the picture.

Obama Says Romney Is Being Dishonest About Auto Bailout

Damon Winter/The New York Times President Obama spoke at a campaign event in Hilliard, Ohio, on Friday. Mr. Obama is spending the entire day in the swing state.

HILLIARD, Ohio â€" President Obama, returning to full-throated campaign mode after a week upended by Hurricane Sandy, accused Mitt Romney on Friday of dishonesty in claiming that his administration's auto bailout had resulted in jobs moving to China.

Speaking to 2,800 people in a cavernous barn here, Mr. Obama took aim at Mr. Romney for an advertisement his campaign aired in Ohio, which said that Chrysler, under new Italian owners, moved Jeep production to Chi na after being bailed out by the Obama administration in 2009.

“That's not true,” Mr. Obama said as the crowd chanted “liar.” “Everybody knows it's not true. The car companies themselves have told Governor Romney to knock it off.”

The ad, the president said, amounted to a cynical ploy to compensate for the fact that Mr. Romney opposed the bailout. “This isn't a game; these are people's jobs, these are people's lives,” he said.

Saying that the commercial had rattled some employees at the Jeep plant in Toledo, Mr. Obama said, “You don't scare hard-working Americans just to scare up some votes.”

Mr. Obama's counterattack kicked off a day of barnstorming in a state where he is fighting to cling to a narrow, but stubborn, lead in the polls against a strong offensive by Mr. Romney, who plans a last-minute bus tour in the state over the weekend.

In the final days of the campaign, the escalating confront ation over the auto bailout has dominated headlines and news coverage in Ohio and Michigan.

Mr. Romney's campaign countered the president's criticism by insisting that its ad was accurate.

“The facts are clear: despite his false and misleading attacks, President Obama took the auto companies into bankruptcy,” said a campaign spokeswoman, Amanda Henneberg. “His mismanagement of the process has exposed taxpayers to a $25 billion loss. And these companies are expanding production overseas.”

Ms. Henneberg said the United States had lost 586,000 manufacturing jobs during Mr. Obama's presidency.

The president was buoyed by a better-than-expected jobs report on Friday. “This morning we learned that companies hired more workers in October than at any time in the last eight months,” Mr. Obama said, while acknowledging, as he always does, that more work remains.

Mr. Obama was also still riding the crest of endorsements by Mayor Michael R. Bloo mberg of New York City, the former secretary of state, Colin L. Powell, and a trip to New Jersey, where the Republican governor, Chris Christie, heaped praise on his response to the storm.

But the show of bipartisan harmony in New Jersey on Wednesday seemed a world away from this chilly Midwestern fairground, where even the minister who offered the religious invocation, Dr. Marilyn Miller, jabbed Mr. Romney for his remarks about the 47 percent.

Warming up the crowd, former Gov. Ted Strickland of Ohio characterized a canned-goods drive that Mr. Romney held in Dayton for storm victims as a cynical photo opportunity.

“Let me say something about Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan: they don't even know how to fake compassion,” said Mr. Strickland, who has emerged as one of Mr. Obama's most pugilistic surrogates.

Urging the audience to vote, Mr. Strickland said Ohio was “the firewall for President Obama.” So much attention has been lavished here in the wanin g days of this election that it sometimes seems like the candidates have been wooing Ohio one voter at a time.

This was the first rally on a day that will take Mr. Obama to Ohio's nooks and crannies. From Hilliard, a farming town of 28,435 northwest of Columbus, he will travel by motorcade, helicopter, and Air Force One to Springfield and Lima for speeches at two high schools.

The Obama campaign has projected steadfast confidence that it will hold on to Ohio, citing polls that show Mr. Obama ahead by a nearly two-to-one margin among the 23 percent of registered voters who have already cast ballots.

If those numbers are accurate, the campaign said, Mr. Romney would have to run up a margin of 54 percent on Election Day just to tie with Mr. Obama. The Romney campaign insists that Democrats are performing below their early-voting levels in 2008, while Republicans are outperforming.

From the Abstract Sunday Blog: An Electoral-College Primer

Go to the full feature on the Abstract Sunday blog.

Romney\'s Closing Argument: \'Look to the Record\'

Stephen Crowley/The New York Times Mitt Romney greeted supporters at a campaign rally on Friday in West Allis, Wis.

WEST ALLIS, Wis. â€" At the start of a frantic final weekend of campaigning, Mitt Romney on Friday urged voters to judge him on his record in government and accomplishments in the private sector, arguing in a lofty speech that he offered deeper experience and a greater commitment to bipartisanship than President Obama.

In what his aides called a closing argument to the electorate after 18 months of bruising politics, Mr. Romney asked that Americans “look to the record, the accomplishments and failures, and the judgment.”

“President Obama promised change, but he could not deliver it,” Mr. Romney said. “I promise change, and I have a record of achieving it.”

“Words are cheap,” he said, in an allusion to Mr. Obama's skills as an orator. “A record is real and earned with effort. Change cannot be measured in speeches; it is measured in achievements.”

With four days left in the campaign, Mr. Romney traveled to the swing state of Wisconsin, a state that the president carried handily in 2008 but where polls show a neck-and-neck contest this time around. In a nod to his running mate, Representative Paul D. Ryan, a Wisconsinite whose selection has lifted his standing in the state, Mr. Romney said, “Next to Ann Romney, Paul Ryan is the best choice I ever made.”

After weeks of rallies at high school fields and factory floors, Mr. Romney's speech here had a formality and sweep that are frequently missing from his day-to-day campaigning. He wore a dark sui t and read from a teleprompter.

Mr. Romney portrayed the Obama presidency as a series of broken promises and a time of unrealized potential.

“Four years ago, candidate Obama promised to do so very much, but he has fallen so very short,” he said. “He promised to be a post-partisan president, but he became the most partisan - blaming, attacking, dividing.”

“He was going to focus on creating jobs,” he added. “Instead, he focused on Obamacare, which killed jobs. He said he was going to cut the federal deficit by half. Then he doubled it.”

Mr. Romney offered himself up as a tested leader, doing something he rarely does on the campaign trail - spinning through his entire résumé. He alluded to his time as chief executive of Bain Capital, the private equity firm; his role in turning around Bain Consulting, which ran into financial trouble; his stint running the Salt Lake City Olympic Games; and his term as governor of Massachusetts.

As he has throughout the past few weeks, Mr. Romney played up the theme of bipartisanship, arguing that Mr. Obama had alienated Republicans with his tactics and would be unable to change the tenor of Washington.

“I won't waste any time complaining about my predecessor,” he said. “I won't spend my effort trying to pass partisan legislation unrelated to economic growth. From Day 1, I will go to work to help Americans get back to work.”

Politicians and Their Personal Finances

For this weekend's Your Money column, I tried to profile the poorest members of Congress in all the land. Given the limited financial disclosures that our elected representatives must make, which the Center for Responsive Politics does a nice job of collecting in one place, it's hard to say for sure who has the lowest net worth.

But Representative Joe Walsh, who is in a tough re-election battle, is probably among the poorest. He has also had his personal finances laid bare in the last couple of years. Chicago-area reporters have revealed tax liens, driver's license suspensions, a child support dispute, a foreclosure and other issues.

At what point should politicians' financial troubles keep you from giving them your vote? Should a single foreclosure be disqualifying? An accusation of being behind in child support payments, even one that is later resolved, as Representative Walsh's was? And is a pattern of such problems over time evidence of a kind of irresponsi bility that simply goes too far? Or is it a sad sort of behavioral problem that may not transfer into how someone would handle the public's money?

Politicians and Their Personal Finances

For this weekend's Your Money column, I tried to profile the poorest members of Congress in all the land. Given the limited financial disclosures that our elected representatives must make, which the Center for Responsive Politics does a nice job of collecting in one place, it's hard to say for sure who has the lowest net worth.

But Representative Joe Walsh, who is in a tough re-election battle, is probably among the poorest. He has also had his personal finances laid bare in the last couple of years. Chicago-area reporters have revealed tax liens, driver's license suspensions, a child support dispute, a foreclosure and other issues.

At what point should politicians' financial troubles keep you from giving them your vote? Should a single foreclosure be disqualifying? An accusation of being behind in child support payments, even one that is later resolved, as Representative Walsh's was? And is a pattern of such problems over time evidence of a kind of irresponsi bility that simply goes too far? Or is it a sad sort of behavioral problem that may not transfer into how someone would handle the public's money?

A Measure of Protection, Just in Case

In his Wealth Matters column this week, Paul Sullivan talks about protecting your assets in case you're sued. While he notes that you can never completely protect yourself, you can take steps to discourage people from pursuing you.

A big mistake that many people make, a wealth adviser told Paul, is that they assume the worst will never happen to them. But if nothing else, Hurricane Sandy - a storm that seemed to come out of nowhere - serves as a reminder that the worst can happen.

Tell us about your efforts to protect your assets for yourself or your heirs. What did you learn from the experience? And what advice can you offer to others?

Friday Reading: No SAT in Several States Due to Storm

A variety of consumer-focused articles appears daily in The New York Times and on our blogs. Each weekday morning, we gather them together here so you can quickly scan the news that could hit you in your wallet.

• Gasoline runs short, adding to woes after Hurricane Sandy. (N.Y./Region)
• In crisis, public officials embrace social media. (National)
• Little federal help for long-term unemployed. (Business)
• Westin hotels lend gear so travelers can exercise. (Business)
• Consumer confidence and spending are rising, reports show. (Business)
• Advocates work to save ex-racehorses from slaughter. (Sports)
• N.Y.C. Marathon presses on as backlash builds. (Sports)
• Hurricane puts big dent in auto business. (Wheels)
• What cellphone carriers say about hurricane recovery. (Bits)
• Headphones that blend fashion and performance. (Gadgetwise)
• How to keep electronics going with no power. (Pogue's Posts)
• How to bypass the nursing home-hospital revolving door. (The New Old Age)
• SAT canceled in several states due to storm. (The Choice)
• To book a hotel in New York call, don't surf. (In Transit)