Ed Gillespie, adviser to the Romney campaign, defended the campaign’s assertion that six independent studies have validated the plausibility of Mitt Romney’s tax plan, a talking point used by both Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan to defend the plan against attacks that the math doesn’t ad up. “Six different studies have said this is entirely doable,” Gillespie said on “Fox News Sunday.”
But host Chris Wallace took issue with the assertion, calling some of the studies “questionable.”
“These are very credible sources,” Gillespie pushed back.
“One of these is from a guy — is a blog from a guy who was a top adviser to George W. Bush,” Wallace countered. “These are hardly non-partisan studies.”
Gillespie said that these are from Harvard and AEI and that said again that they are “very credible sources.”
Here’s the full exchange, via Fox:
GILLESPIE: Six different studies have said —
WALLACE: Those are very questionable. Some of them are blogs. Some of them are from the AEI, which is hardly an independent group. Those are not —
GILLESPIE: These are very credible sources, and, you know —
WALLACE: One of them is from a guy who is — a blog from a high who was a top advisor to George W. Bush. These are hardly nonpartisan studies.
GILLESPIE: Look, Chris, this — I think if you look at Harvard and AEI and other studies, are very credible sources for economic analysis.
WALLACE: You wouldn’t say that AEI is a conservative think tank.
GILLESPIE: I would say it is a right-leaning think tank. That doesn’t make it not credible.
WALLACE: It doesn’t make it nonpartisan.
GILLESPIE: It does make it nonpartisan. It’s not a partisan organization. I can tell you, there have been many instances where there are things that AEI has come out with and said, I didn’t find to be necessarily —
(CROSSTALK)
GILLESPIE: — with the Republican Party.
WALLACE: Would you say the Brookings Institution is nonpartisan?
GILLESPIE: I would say the Brookings Institution is left leaning and that they are nonpartisan.
