(CNN) - Democrats eager to portray John McCain as out of touch with average Americans and as a flip-flopper seized on a report Sunday the Arizona senator and his wife, Cindy, own more than a dozen cars - including several foreign-made automobiles.
A Newsweek article published on the magazine's Web Site Sunday said registration records show the McCains currently own 13 cars - two of which are foreign-made: a Honda and a Volkswagen. That appears to contradict the Republican presidential nominee's past statements he only buys cars made in America. (Cindy McCain also drives a Lexus and daughter Meghan owns a Toyota Prius, but neither are registered to the McCains.)
Newsweek also reported Barack Obama owns one car: a Ford Escape Hybrid.
In a quickly-arranged conference call organized by the Democratic National Committee, United Auto Worker Union President Ron Gettelfinger - an Obama supporter - said the registration records show McCain is not being truthful with Americans and undermining autoworkers.
Listen: Gettelfinger blasts McCain on conference call with reporters
"The last thing we need is a presidential candidate who undermines autoworkers, and these days it seems that John McCain is doing just exactly that," he said. "When he's in the Midwest, he tells voters he supports the industry, when he is in other states he brags about buying a foreign car, as he did with the Prius." (It is not clear if McCain or his daughter bought the Prius)
Gettelfinger also pointed to comments McCain made in an interview with Detroit TV station WXYZ, saying, "I've bought American literally all my life and I'm proud."
"That's really a nice campaign line," Gettelfinger said of the comments. "But it turns out that John McCain wasn't being straight with the people of Detroit, or the state of Michigan, or our country as a matter of effect," adding later, "The American auto industry and the American voters deserve a president who will be straight with them.”
For the record, Honda has four major automobile and engine plants in the United States employing more than 25,000 Americans, according to its Web site. Volkswagen is scheduled to open a plant in Tennessee in 2011 that is expected to employ 2,000 people, the AP reported in July.
Brian Rogers, a spokesman for McCain, said "Barack Obama is more interested in childish political attacks than confronting the reality that his plans to raise taxes and close off trade will kill our American auto industry and the jobs of hardworking folks in Michigan and all around our nation."
Rogers also said McCain was referring to his own car in the WXYZ interview: "He drives a Cadillac today and has always driven American cars," Rogers said.
Newsweek's report comes a month after McCain now-infamously could not name how many houses he owned in an interview with Politico. The publication later reported he owns at least eight properties.
A massive crowd came out for Palin at the Villages. (Wes Little/CNN)
LADY LAKE, Florida (CNN) – The Villages, which bills itself as “Florida’s premier active adult retirement community,” is a regular stopover for presidential candidates hunting for votes in this quadrennial electoral battleground.
Sarah Palin chose the sprawling golf haven as the place to make her Florida debut on Saturday, just her fifth campaign event apart from John McCain since becoming the vice presidential nominee. It may have been a wise choice, if only for the optics - on the same day Barack Obama drew over 20,000 voters to an outdoor rally in North Carolina, Palin attracted tens of thousands of her own sun-baked supporters.
Though the audience was one of the Palin’s largest to date, the actual size of the crowd was unclear. According Mike Tucker, the fire chief of The Villages who was made available to the press by the McCain campaign, 60,000 people crammed into the streets to see Palin speak.
“There were people down the side streets, people down in the parking areas, people who couldn't quite make it around to the main areas,” Tucker said, adding that many people were let into the rally without tickets, making the crowd count impossible to verify.
The statement:
"He said he won't raise taxes for most people, but he's voted 94 times in his short Senate career for tax increases and against tax cuts."
-Sen. John McCain, at a campaign stop in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Friday Sept. 19, 2008
Check out the facts after the jump!
(CNN) – Sarah Palin is campaigning in Lady Lake, Florida this hour.
Watch the event on CNN.com/live!
(CNN) - John McCain delivered a speech on the economy Sunday that was sharply critical of Barack Obama.
“Whether it’s a reversal in war, or an economic emergency, he reacts as a politician and not as a leader, seeking an advantage for himself instead of a solution for his country," he said.
Read McCain's full prepared remarks after the jump.
(CNN) - Saturday Night Live, the longtime NBC sketch comedy show that has arguably wielded significant influence this presidential election season, skewered the McCain-Palin ticket for the second straight week in a row Saturday.
In the show’s opening sketch, a Darrell Hammond impersonation of John McCain is shown in an advertising studio recording his tagline for a bevy of negative - and ridiculously false - campaign ads. The ads level such allegations as Barack Obama wants healthcare coverage for the entire universe (including Osama bin Laden) and supports tax cuts for pedophiles.
The sketch also takes a dig at McCain's age, portraying the Arizona senator as unfamiliar with digital recording technology (After he is told it is a new technology McCain says, "Like 8-track?")
Politico reported Saturday the sketch was actually conceived by former SNL writer Al Franken, the current Democratic challenger to Norm Coleman's Minnesota Senate seat.
SNL has already proven its ability to crystallize emerging campaign narratives this election cycle, widely credited with raising a general perception the media was in love with Obama during the primary election season in a series of sketches last winter. SNL's portrayal of Sarah Palin last weekend also synthesized several questions raised about the Alaska governor's readiness to serve as vice president.
With a weekly viewership stretching into the millions that reaches a swath of (mostly young) voters who aren't as closely following the ins and outs on the campaign trail, SNL has a clear ability to shape general perceptions of both presidential tickets in the final stretch of the race for the White House.
Responding to SNL's depiction of McCain, spokesman Tucker Bounds said, "Saturday Night Live is funny, Barack Obama showing no sign of life or leadership during a banking crisis is not funny."
Barack Obama holds a campaign rally in Charlotte, North Carolina Sunday. (Mike Roselli/CNN)
He's heavily targeting the state that has voted Republican in several recent presidential elections. During his remarks, he said the $700 billion financial market bailout has a “sobering price tag," and accused the Bush administration of running the economy into the ground. He also got tough on John McCain:
“While I certainly don’t fault Senate McCain for all of the problems we’re facing right now but I do fault the economic philosophy he’s followed during his 26 years in Washington,” he said, adding “If your car is in a ditch, you don’t want a driver who thinks that we should take the same path that’s got us in the ditch.”
The statement:
"If my opponent had his way, the millions of Floridians who rely on it would have had their Social Security tied up in the stock market this week... Millions would've watched as the market tumbled and their nest egg disappeared before their eyes. Millions of families would've been scrambling to figure out how to give their mothers and their fathers, their grandmothers and their grandfathers, the security retirement that every American deserves."
– Sen. Barack Obama, at a campaign stop Saturday, September 20, in Daytona Beach, Florida.
Check out the facts after the jump!
(CNN) - John McCain's economic adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin laughed off his now infamous BlackBerry comment on Sunday, and jokingly laid out his new campaign strategy.
"Many lessons here-number one, no sense of humor on the campaign trail. I swear off telling any jokes," Holtz-Eakin told CNN's Wolf Blitzer. He went on to add that he wouldn't talk about the history of technology anymore either.
Holtz-Eakin came under fire earlier this week for implying that McCain invented the BlackBerry. When asked during a press briefing on Tuesday what McCain did as chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, Holtz-Eakin held up his Blackberry and said: "He did this".
Jordan and Dale clean the bugs off the front windshield at Love's Truck Stop in Sanders, Kentucky
From CNN Politics
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