The Real Romney, FEMA Edition

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CORE MESSAGE

Mitt Romney's hiding the truth -- so the American people forget he's not on our side.

Connect: We want honest leaders who say what they mean, especially when they're claiming to be on our side.

Define: Romney's hiding the truth about his positions from the American people, just like he's hiding his tax returns -- because the more voters learn what he'd do to our country, the more they know he's not on our side.

Illustrate: Romney actually wants to privatize FEMA and turn all disaster response over to the states, guaranteeing less funding. But now with Frankenstorm Sandy, of course he's saying he'd leave FEMA alone.

Broaden: He's doing the same thing on issues that people have deeply-held beliefs about, like abortion -- just like he's trying to hide that he would've made America's auto industry fail and that he wrote off 47% of Americans as irresponsible victims.

Discredit: It's no wonder Americans trust President Obama more than Romney on the big issues and say Obama cares more about the middle class and ordinary Americans.

Call out: Romney keeps hiding the truth so voters will forget that he's not on our side. If he can't be trusted to come clean to the American people, he can't be trusted to represent us.

REMEMBER THE REAL ROMNEY

DISASTER RESPONSE

Republican primary presidential debate question: "FEMA is about to run out of money…How do you deal with something like that?"

Romney: "Every time you have an occasion to take something from the federal government and send it back to the states, that’s the right direction. If you can go even further and send it back to the private sector, that’s even better…. We should take all of what we’re doing at the federal level and say, what are the things we’re doing that we don’t have to do? And those things we’ve got to stop doing."

THE 47%

Romney: "There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what.…who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. …These are people who pay no income tax. … [M]y job is is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."

ABORTION

Romney admits he'd be "delighted" to sign a bill to not allow any abortions "at all, period."

TAXES

Romney says his goal is to cut taxes for "the top one percent" and that "my low tax rate" of just 10% is "fair."

AUTO RESCUE

Romney on the auto rescue: "Let Detroit Go Bankrupt," and "I said we should take Detroit bankrupt, and that's right."

JOBS

According to Romney, "[Obama] says we need more firemen, more policemen, more teachers. Did he not get the message of Wisconsin? ...It's time for us to cut back on government."

Romney admits massive spending cuts will "throw us into recession or depression."

POVERTY

Romney: "I'm not concerned about the very poor."

We develop messaging by aggregating, analyzing and distilling polling, tested messaging, and expert recommendations, and monitoring the media to identify what is and isn't working. See here for some of the experts and organizations we draw on.