The Obama campaign is highlighting an awkward moment from Mitt Romney’s Ohio town hall today in which he took a question from a woman who said the president should be “tried for treason,” without condemning the line. They also accused Ohio state auditor Dave Yost, who introduced Romney, of attacking the Obama family by accusing the president of “fly[ing] to New York just to have a date night with your spouse.”
“Today we saw Mitt Romney’s version of leadership: standing by silently as his chief surrogate attacked the President’s family at the event and another supporter alleged that the President should be tried for treason,” Obama spokeswoman Lis Smith said in a statement. “Time after time in this campaign, Mitt Romney has had the opportunity to show that he has the fortitude to stand up to hateful and over-the-line rhetoric and time after time, he has failed to do so. If this is the ‘leadership’ he has shown on the campaign trail, what can the American people expect of him as commander-in-chief?”
Romney said after the event that “of course” he disagreed with the questioner who brought up treason charges.
Correction: An earlier version of this wire misidentified the first name of Ohio’s state auditor, Dave Yost. It has since been corrected. TPM regrets the error.
