John Kerry: Romney will ‘swiftboat’ Obama

Published March 29, 2012 4:00am ET



Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., warned that President Obama faces a “swiftboating” from Mitt Romney after one of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth (whose television ads helped sink Kerry’s 2004 campaign) donated to Romney’s super PAC.

“Bob Perry, the deep-pocketed funder of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth,” just gave $3 million to Mitt Romney’s Super PAC,” Kerry wrote in a fundraising email asking Obama supporters to donate three dollars to the president’s campaign. “One man. Three million dollars.”

Kerry, a multimillionaire married to a billionaire heiress, acted aghast at the wealth of Romney’s superPAC donor. “Their multi-million dollar smear tactics were new in 2004; in 2012 we know their playbook, and shame on us if we don’t tear it into shreds,” he wrote. “Join me and we will stop the ‘swiftboating of President Obama.”