Sherrod Brown: Obama Is Disappointing On Manufacturing

Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH)
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President Obama will arrive in Cleveland Tuesday for a series of small business events with entrepreneurs and members of his own cabinet.

But the Democratic senator from that state is unhappy with Obama’s performance on this score thus far — particularly when it comes to promoting manufacturing. And he’s taking his critique public.

“The President’s done more on manufacturing than his predecessors, but not nearly enough,” Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) told me in an interview Friday. “That needs a real strategy on making things. We ought to make things in this country. And it’s a strategy on a different trade policy, a different tax policy, an emphasis on working with small manufacturers.”

Brown says he’s made a lot of noise about this to the administration, and to the President himself — “Every week. Directly, indirectly. To his staff. To him.” But the administration isn’t structured in a way that helps foster this sort of policy.

“I think they’re doing some things. Ron Bloom [the White House manufacturing adviser] has been very good. Bloom is not in quite the right place to have his voice heard. His message is not followed as often as I’d like to see.”

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