By Colleen McCain Nelson And Nick Timiraos
WASHINGTON--President Barack Obama will launch a three-day
roadshow Wednesday that will herald his economic policies while
offering a preview of some of the proposals he will detail in his
State of the Union address on Jan. 20.
The tour, which will take the president to Michigan, Arizona and
Tennessee, will lay the groundwork for new executive actions and
legislative policy proposals on issues including housing,
manufacturing and higher education. Mr. Obama's economic pitch also
will serve as a counterweight to the Republican legislative agenda
as the new GOP-controlled Congress starts work this week.
The aggressive push, aimed at building momentum for the White
House's economic policies, will begin with a speech at a Ford Motor
Co. assembly plant near Detroit. The president will highlight the
success of the government's auto industry bailout and discuss new
efforts to promote advanced manufacturing and innovation in the
country's research base.
"Manufacturing has come surging back," Mr. Obama said Tuesday at
a White House meeting with governors. "We have seen almost every
economic indicator improve, in some ways improve dramatically."
Manufacturing jobs have increased over the past five years after
declining for decades, as firms benefit from more competitive
energy and labor costs. Factories have added around 700,000 workers
since 2010, pushing payrolls to more than 12 million and marking
the best stretch of hiring for the sector since the 1990s.
Still, manufacturing employment is down around 11%, or about 1.5
million jobs, since the recession began in late 2007. Mr. Obama is
still short of his goal of creating one million manufacturing jobs
during his second term, with around 250,000 manufacturing jobs
added since 2012.
And while the White House has touted what it calls a resurgence
in manufacturing, the administration has faced mixed reviews from
industry groups.
Scott Paul, president of the Alliance for American
Manufacturing, said the president's trade policies are harmful to
auto workers. "The administration fails to mention that we've only
recovered one-third of the good-paying manufacturing jobs that were
destroyed in the recession, " he said. "We still have a long way to
go."
When discussing the auto bailout in Michigan, White House
officials said, Mr. Obama will underscore the effects of the
administration's policies and set the stage for the next steps the
president plans to propose. White House press secretary Josh
Earnest said Tuesday the president's effort to rescue the U.S. auto
industry was a politically unpopular decision that has "paid off in
spades."
Last month, the Treasury Department sold the last of its stakes
in auto lender Ally Financial Inc., ending the administration's
bailout of the auto industry. The Treasury said it turned a $2.4
billion profit on the $17.2 billion investment in the company.
Losses on rescues of GM and Chrysler Group LLC mean that the
auto bailout ultimately cost taxpayers $9.3 billion, lower than
earlier estimates envisioned. The Center for Automotive Research,
an Ann Arbor, Mich., think tank that supported the 2008 bailouts,
said those rescues spared 1.2 million jobs in 2009.
After touting the auto bailout and the growing economy on
Wednesday, Mr. Obama is expected to focus on housing Thursday
during a speech in Arizona. There, the president will announce
plans to cut fees home buyers must pay for certain mortgages that
are insured by the Federal Housing Administration, as part of a
broader campaign to improve access to credit.
On Friday, in Tennessee, Mr. Obama is expected to offer
proposals to help more students go to college.
The president's cross-country promotion of his economic agenda
is a departure for this White House, which has closely held the
details of each year's State of the Union address up until the
moment Mr. Obama delivered the speech.
In an op-ed on Medium.com, Dan Pfeiffer, a senior adviser to the
president, dubbed the preview of new policy proposals "SOTU
spoilers." "The president didn't want to wait until the State of
the Union to take new steps to help the middle class and lay out
his ideas to keep strengthening the economy," he wrote.
The retooled strategy also serves as counterprogramming during
the week that Congress returns, sending the message that the
president doesn't plan to cede the stage to Republican leaders. The
White House has taken an aggressive posture with GOP lawmakers this
week, announcing Tuesday that Mr. Obama would veto two Republican
priorities: legislation approving the Keystone XL pipeline and a
change to the Affordable Care Act that would redefine full-time
employment as 40 hours a week.
The veto threats elicited swift rebukes from Republican leaders,
with House Speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio) saying the president was
siding with "fringe extremists" in the Democratic Party on the
pipeline project.
Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said
important bills now will get a vote in the GOP-controlled Congress
but added: "Will the president's desk be where common sense
legislation goes to die for the next two years?"
Write to Colleen McCain Nelson at colleen.nelson@wsj.com and
Nick Timiraos at nick.timiraos@wsj.com
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