To win a second term, President Obama must reassure the recession-crushed middle class that he will help create the jobs needed to eventually turn around a stubbornly slumping economy, political consultants say. “There’s plenty of indication that the economy is in recovery, however slow it may be, and I don’t think anybody disputes that,” said Bill Carrick, a Democratic consultant who worked on the campaigns of former President Clinton and the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy. “It’s just all a question of: How fast are the jobs going to come back?”
Voters’ confidence in the strength of the recovery fell this month following reports that employers added just 54,000 jobs in May, down from 232,000 in April, according to the Labor Department.
As the White House scrambled to contain the damaging news, Obama traveled to a Chrysler manufacturing plant in Toledo, Ohio, to celebrate the success of his much-disputed 2009 bailout of automobile manufacturers.
The president argued that he saved the auto industry — and hundreds of thousands of American jobs — by investing in Chrysler and General Motors when the companies were on the verge of liquidation. “This industry is back on its feet, repaying its debts, gaining ground,” he said, adding that the plant’s workers are “showing the world that American manufacturing and American industry is back.”
Obama did not directly address the jobs report, which also showed that the unemployment rate had jumped again, this time from 9 percent to 9.1 percent, in May.
“If you got hit by a truck, it’s going to take a while for you to mend,” Obama said. “And that’s what’s happening to our economy. It’s taking a while to mend. There are always going to be bumps on the road to recovery.”
Obama used the event to argue that budgetary belt-tightening must be accompanied by additional government spending on education, infrastructure and clean energy if America is to “win the future,” as his campaign slogan puts it.
He promised better days ahead, saying he would consider tax breaks and regulatory relief for small businesses.
Analysts say Obama will have to get more specific on how he intends to spur job creation while making the case that Republicans are offering no workable alternative.
“He has to draw a contrast with the other side and talk about what they are going to do, and show that [Republican proposals] will take us backwards … and just give tax breaks to the wealthiest and to the big oil companies,” said Mo Elleithee, a Democratic consultant with D.C.’s Hilltop Public Solutions.
Republicans, meanwhile, are rebutting Obama’s claims that his policies will eventually turn the economy around.
“Our goal should be to make it easier and cheaper to create private-sector jobs in this country,” Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., said in the Republican’s weekly radio address. “But unfortunately, recent actions by the administration are making that hard to accomplish.”
Elleithee said Obama will have to remind Americans that he inherited the recession from his Republican predecessor, George W. Bush.
“I think most people understand that the economy isn’t going to turn around overnight,” he said. “But people are rightfully frustrated with the pace of the recovery.”
“I think it’s going to be a close election,” he added.
