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Articles by Seth McLaughlin

Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, speaks at a campaign stop at LeClaire Manufacturing in Midland, Texas, on Wednesday. (Associated Press)

Tea party voters lack enthusiasm for Romney

Killing time before Mitt Romney's campaign rally in New Hampshire this week, GOP activist Paul Clark shared the story of how some tea party activists in the crowd had assured him that they would vote for the presumptive GOP nominee come Election Day.

August 22, 2012
Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan speaks Aug. 21, 2012, during a campaign rally at Beaver Steel in Carnegie, Pa. (Associated Press)

Ryan slams Obama plan as harmful to Medicare

For the first time since being named Mitt Romney's running mate, Rep. Paul Ryan journeyed to Pennsylvania, where he warned that President Obama's new health care law will force Medicare recipients to pay more for their coverage and make it harder for them to find hospitals and nursing homes that will let them in the door.

August 21, 2012
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, and Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, his running mate, attend a town hall at St. Anselm College in Manchester, N.H., on Monday. The visit marked the first joint appearance for Mr. Romney and Mr. Ryan in New Hampshire. (Associated Press)

Romney backs audit for Fed, vows
 to not raise taxes on middle class

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and Rep. Paul Ryan, his running mate, joined forces Monday in New Hampshire to chastise President Obama for running a negative campaign and to push back against the Democrat's claim that they will raise taxes on middle-class families to help cover the cost of tax cuts for the wealthy.

August 20, 2012
The plan by Republican vice presidential nominee-in-waiting Rep. Paul Ryan for rescuing Medicare from looming financial insolvency took a backseat when the party’s standard-bearer was campaigning Tuesday in Ohio. (Associated Press)

Romney’s defense of Medicare plan: Attack Obama

Days after tapping Paul Ryan as his running mate, Mitt Romney has sidelined the Wisconsin Republican's marquee Medicare overhaul plan and has instead gone back to attacking President Obama's health care law, which siphons more than $700 billion from the retiree health program over the next 10 years.

August 14, 2012
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney campaigns Aug. 8, 2012, at Central Campus High School in Des Moines, Iowa. (Associated Press)

Veteran of 1990s welfare shift faults both sides in current clash

A former senior House GOP aide who helped write the landmark welfare-to-work laws in the 1990s challenged Mitt Romney's assertion that President Obama's wants to weaken work requirements for welfare recipients — but he also questioned whether the White House is overstepping its authority by giving states the chance to experiment with their welfare programs.

August 8, 2012
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney thanks Warren Young, chief executive officer at Acme Industries, as he campaigns in Elk Grove Village, Ill., on Aug. 7, 2012. (Associated Press)

Romney: Obama undermining welfare reform

Republican challenger Mitt Romney said Tuesday that President Obama is "encouraging a culture of dependency" by gutting the work requirement in the landmark federal welfare reform law, and his campaign went a step further, saying the White House overstepped its legal authority last month to issue waivers of the law to the states.

August 7, 2012
Mitt Romney combines campaigning with a grocery store run in Wolfeboro, N.H., on Monday. According to polls, voters say Mr. Romney is better equipped to handle the economy, but they’d rather have a beer with President Obama. (Associated Press)

Romney ad blitz focuses on economic trust

Mitt Romney and his presidential campaign are invading living rooms in key states across the country through a barrage of television ads that aim to convince voters that their economic well-being hinges on a change in the White House.

August 6, 2012
President Obama told a crowd Wednesday in Mansfield, Ohio, that the tax cut Republican Mitt Romney proposes would come at the expense of the middle class. (Associated Press)

Obama claim Romney tax cut would hurt middle class disputed

Seizing on a new report that challenges Mitt Romney's tax-cut claims, President Obama said Wednesday that the presumptive Republican nominee is trying to make middle-class families pay more "so that people like him" pay less.

August 1, 2012
Republican presidential candidate and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney meets Polish veterans from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars as he visits the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Warsaw, Poland, Tuesday, July 31, 2012. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

Romney’s trip a bumpy ride

Under mounting pressure to be more open on foreign policy issues, Mitt Romney tried to do just that during his six-day trip to visit three American allies — but repeatedly found himself having to backtrack on the things he said.

July 31, 2012
** FILE ** Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican nominee, and his wife, Ann, arrive in Gdansk, Poland, on Monday, July 30, 2012. (Associated Press)

Romney endures tough road trip

On a trip Mitt Romney hoped would impress America's allies, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee managed to anger the nation's potential adversaries — particularly Palestinian leaders, who felt Mr. Romney's comments during his trip to Israel smacked of racism.

July 30, 2012
** FILE ** Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

McDonnell targets defense spending, but opposes automatic cuts

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell says that defense spending must be reined in if Congress is serious about getting the nation's fiscal house in order but opposes the $500 billion in automatic defense cuts under last year's debt deal, warning they would weaken national security, kill jobs and devastate his state's defense industry.

July 29, 2012
“[Romney] reflexively criticizes the president’s policies without offering any alternatives. When he does venture a position, it’s a safe bet that he previously took exactly the opposite position and will probably change his mind again and land in the wrong place — far out of the mainstream. Or he mischaracterizes our record to create a nonexistent contrast.” - Vice President Joseph R. Biden (Associated Press)

Romney uses trip to stress foreign policy

Taking a brief turn from the domestic issues that have dominated the campaign, presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney kicks off a three-nation overseas trip Thursday that gives him the chance to showcase his differences with President Obama on the foreign policy front and to convince voters that he has the political chops to be a major world player.

July 25, 2012
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney addresses the 113th National Convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Reno, Nev., on July 24, 2012. (Associated Press)

Romney slams security leaks, blames White House

Presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney accused the White House of leaking classified information to the press for political gain and called for a special counsel to carry out a "full and prompt investigation" into who is responsible for dishing out the national security goods.

July 24, 2012
Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson, interviewed at The Washington Times, says he will not release his tax returns because he has suffered losses in recent years. debates. He also said he has more executive experience than Mitt Romney and President Obama combined, but needs to get into national debates for voters to understand that he’s the choice for voters unhappy with both of them. (Raymond Thompson/The Washington Times)

Johnson to voters: Give Libertarian a chance

Libertarian Party presidential nominee Gary Johnson said Monday that he won't release his tax returns, joining his voice to that of presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney, who has declined to release more than the two most recent years.

July 23, 2012
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney speaks to the annual meeting of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in Houston on Wednesday, July 11, 2012. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Campaigns trade charges of lying; Romney camp seeks apology

President Obama's campaign said Wednesday that Mitt Romney either lied to voters or to federal regulators about how long he ran his company, while the GOP candidate's team said the "felony" accusation was so over-the-top that the president should apologize for his aides' behavior; voters were left to sort it all out.

July 12, 2012
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney speaks to the annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People on Wednesday, July 11, 2012, in Houston. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

NAACP is hard sell for Romney

Trying to cut into President Obama's overwhelming lead among black voters, presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney told the nation's leading African-American civil rights group that blacks have suffered more than most on the president's watch and he plans to fight for their vote.

July 11, 2012
President Obama shares a laugh July 10, 2012, with Jason and Ali McLaughlin and their son, Cooper, while visiting their home in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. (Associated Press)

Rich must pay more taxes, Obama tells voters

A day after demanding Washington lawmakers extend middle-class tax cuts while raising taxes on the wealthy, President Obama took his case directly to voters Tuesday, traveling to Iowa to argue that the rich should pay higher taxes in order to cut the deficit and fund his spending priorities.

July 10, 2012
**FILE** Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney campaigns June 19, 2012, in Holland, Mich. (Associated Press)

Romney, RNC post massive June cash haul

Presumptive GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney and the Republican National Committee raised $35 million more than President Obama and his Democratic allies last month, winning their second month in a row.

July 9, 2012
President Obama speaks Thursday at the Wolcott House Museum Complex in Maumee, Ohio, as part of a two-day "Betting on America" bus tour across Ohio and Pennsylvania. Mr. Obama flipped counties across the Rust Belt en route to winning the 2008 presidential election. (Associated Press)

Obama struggles to shine again in Rust Belt

As President Obama is in the middle of a two-day "Betting on America" bus tour across Ohio and Pennsylvania, political analysts said he will have to reassemble the "hope and change" demographic coalition of 2008 that relied on a high turnout of youths and blacks, and winning a larger-than-usual percentage of Hispanics and whites. By most accounts, that will be easier said than done.

July 5, 2012