“What [Mitt Romney’s firm] did was not capitalism, it was bad management. The decision-makers were governed by a different set of rules than the rest of us played by."

In 1993, Mitt Romney and his partners bought majority ownership of a 103-year-old steel mill in Kansas City, Missouri. Less than a decade later, GST Steel declared bankruptcy, and hundreds of workers were left without their jobs, their full pensions, and their health insurance. Yet somehow, Romney and his partners walked away with millions in profits.

This was just one example of "Romney Economics”—buying and selling companies for short-term gain and quick profits for Romney and his partners, with little regard for the workers who could get hurt in the process. It's this experience that Mitt Romney now cites as his key qualification to be president.

Watch the story of GST Steel—then visit romneyeconomics.com for an in-depth look at Romney’s time in the private sector, and the impact his decisions had on workers and communities across the country.

Get the truth

ince last Mother’s Day, President Obama has taken steps to help students afford college, including signing into law historic student loan reforms that better invest in our students and remove big banks as middlemen in the student-lending industry.

The President has also doubled our investment in Pell Grants so an additional 3.7 million students would receive college scholarship aid to access and afford college. Two-thirds of Pell Grant recipients are women.

Mitt Romney's plan to adopt the Ryan budget would cut funds for the Pell Grants that help students go to college by nearly 25%:

“The GOP budget plan that Romney wants to adopt would make steeper cuts to Head Start, Pell Grants and workforce training than to other programs… Ultimately, as a result of such cuts — combined with the budget reductions passed on Obama’s watch — ‘157,000 at-risk children up to age 5 could lose education, health, nutrition, and other services under Head Start, while funds for Pell Grants that help students go to college would fall by nearly 25 percent,’ according to a CBPP analysis of the House GOP proposal.”

The President believes that it's irresponsible to cut investment in our future, and that's why he's made finding for student loans and Pell Grants a priority.

Note: this is the final in a series of posts highlighting what President Obama has accomplished for women since last Mother's Day, posted once per day since Monday.yesterday's post.

Deidre is a volunteer team leader in Nashua with a pretty incredible story, and it doesn't take much time talking to her for it to become clear just how much she loves her kids. Take this for example:

When I got laid off, I had to find work but I couldn't afford daycare. I wanted to be with my kids, so I decided to start a daycare. I love kids and I figured why not. So I did that for six years.

And what happened when her kids got too old for daycare and started going to school?

That's when I started driving the school bus. It was work I could do and take my kids with me. I'd take them with me and drop them off at school.

It may not come as a surprise then that a key member of the volunteer team Deidre leads is her 13-year old daughter, Morgan. I asked Morgan how long she'd been volunteering and she invited me to be more specific.

MORGAN: Like, holding signs or just coming in here?

Holding signs totally counts, I told her.

MORGAN: Since fourth grade.

DEIDRE: Originally they kind of got pulled into it. That was in 2008.

MORGAN: Yeah, at first I was just doing it because my Mom was bringing me along. But then it got fun.

When I asked why she was doing it when she could be doing so many other things with her time, she told said:

MORGAN: I support Obama because I want to have a better future for myself. I don't want to see less jobs when I go out to work, or for our children when they go out to work. Obama's going to give us more jobs, and he'll support my education.

Deidre's concerns were similar, worrying that, without the President to fight for this stuff, her daughters wouldn't be able to access greater opportunity.

DEIDRE: I want her to go to college. My other daughter is in college right now, and student loans are the only way either of them can go. My husband and I can't afford to pay for it otherwise. Neither one of us went to college and we want them to have the opportunities that we did not have.

When asked to name the President's most important initiative so far, Deidre doesn't miss a beat:

Health care. The coverage of young adults up to 26, and the change regarding pre-existing conditions is extremely important to my family, especially with my oldest daughter, who has asthma.

For Deidre, working to re-elect the President is a way of fighting for her family.

I think because he's lived it, President Obama is able to understand what policies that are going to help people. He's gone though school and he had to get student loans - and they haven't been paid off for all that long. He has two kids and they're going to go to college too. He gets it and he really has a vested interest in solving these kinds of problems.

Starting August 1st, many women will have access to contraception through their employer or insurer without co-pays or deductibles, ensuring that more women can make health care decisions based on what’s best for them, not their insurance company.

This measure was long overdue, and the President was proud to sign it into law as part of the Affordable Care Act.

Mitt Romney is eager to roll this progress back — not just to the time before Obamacare, but to the time before women were allowed to control their own reproductive health.

On the infamous Blunt Amendment, designed to put women's health care decisions in the hands of their employers for religious reasons, Romney had this to say:

“Of Course I Support The Blunt Amendment”

Later, when he seemed to be getting with the program and changing his views through a tweet that seemingly disavowed this radical position, Romney doubled down on the Blunt amendment again:

“I didn’t understand his question – of course I support the Blunt amendment… Of course, Roy Blunt, who is my liaison to the Senate, is someone I support and of course I support that amendment.

This Mother's Day, show your support for women everywhere and join Women for Obama.

Note: this is the fifth in a series of posts highlighting what President Obama has accomplished for women since last Mother's Day. We'll post one of these a day through Sunday. Here's yesterday's post.

My name is Robert Spiegelman, and I support President Obama's campaign in New Hampshire by helping out our field staff, providing supporter housing to an organizer in the area, and making lunch for the volunteers and staff at our local office two to three times a week.

I've been involved in New Hampshire campaigns over the years—it's part of life here. We're used to having candidates who are eager to come and speak with us, and we tend to be very involved in the political process.

I jumped on board with then-Senator Obama in 2007 because he presented a chance to see a dramatic change in how the country is run and the way people work together. Since then, the President has been a great leader, particularly in terms of foreign policy. He's stayed cool and calm and taken things very seriously, moving the needle with his thoughtful responses.

To figure out how I can support the campaign, I look at what my skills are and try to figure out the best way I can help. I tend to be very resourceful—I tell people "If you need something, call me and I'll find it for you."

Bringing sanity back to government policy is really important to people in New Hampshire—we have serious problems, and we need serious people working on them. I have a question I would ask any candidate running for office: "Can you give me three examples of areas where you disagree with your opponent, and can you name one area where you've listened to your opponent and came away thinking, 'His or her strategy is better than mine, I'm going to adjust my position'?" Any candidate who can't answer that question shouldn't be running for office, because nobody has a monopoly on reasonable ideas.

Here's what I would say to anyone who hasn't gotten involved yet: You don't want to find yourself waking up on November 7th thinking, "I could have, would have, should have." The important groundwork is laid now, and waiting to get on board only sets things back. So the sooner you take action, the more you can help make sure we win in November.

Join Robert and volunteers in all 50 states by stepping up today.

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