>>> good monday morning, i'm chris jansing . a new and potentially critical week on the trail and the romney campaign is intensifying efforts in the swing states where polls show him running behind. today mitt romney will campaign in colorado and then kick off a bus tour through ohio with running mate paul ryan , trying to put a tough week behind them.
>> a lot of republicans would like to know a lot of your donors would like to know how do you turn this thing around?
>> well, it doesn't need a turnaround. we've got a campaign which is tied with an incumbent president of the united states . i've got a very effective campaign. it's doing a very good job. but not everything i say is elegant, and i want to make it very clear, i want to help 100% of the american people .
>> in back-to-back interviews on " 60 minutes ," both candidates laid out their vision and admitted mistakes. romney said he spoke inelegantly. the president admitting he hadn't changed the culture in washington.
>> i'm the first one to confess that the spirit that i brought to washington, that i wanted to see instituted where we weren't constantly in a political slugfest but were focused more on problem solving , you know, i haven't fully accomplished that.
>> here's the brand-new politico/ george washington university battleground poll. the president has a slight lead over romney , and barring a major event, the window may be closing for romney to make inroads in those key battleground states . let me bring in real politics reporter erin pike and politico's alexander burns. good morning to both of you. erin , not only did mitt romney say his campaign doesn't need a turnaround, yet he said i want to be president of the 100%. is he, though, undoing some of the damage that he did with his 47% comments?
>> he's trying to. i think we'll see him try to do a lot more damage control as he campaigns through ohio this week. a lot of middle-class voters right there. and he'll be campaigning all the way through the state tuesday and wednesday. he's going to have to do a little bit more because the obama campaign continues to use this against him. they have a new ad out in ohio this morning that uses that 47% comment against him.
>> alex , romney went again after president obama for not meeting with benjamin netanyahu . mitt romney said he should be more specific about his own foreign policy , and listen to.
>> well, let's see what i've done since i came into office. i said i'd end the war in iraq . i did. i said that we'd go after al qaeda . they've been decimated in the fatah. that we'd go after bin laden . he's gone. so i've executed on my foreign policy , and it's one that the american people largely agree with. so, you know, if governor romney is suggesting that we should start another war, he should say so.
>> alex , what's he trying to do there?
>> well, first i think what the president is trying to do is, you know, there's been a very consistent critique of his performance on foreign policy from the right, that the obama administration has not been supportive enough of allies like israel, has not been assertive enough with iran. what obama 's trying to do is claim a sort of aggressive middle ground that would force romney in order to make that criticism of the white house , would force romney to take some positions that are just a little bit out of step with where americans are. americans , after iraq and afghanistan, there is a sense, i think, there's not a huge appetite for more military action overseas.
>> it is fascinating that we're talking so much about foreign affairs . i think a place we did not expect to be at this point in the campaign. let me go back to the domestic affairs. erin , you and i ohio girls, both.
>> we are.
>> different parts of the state. poll out this weekend shows the president is up five points. now, this is especially significant since -- well, no republican has won the white house without ohio . and take a look at the romney schedule for the next several days. you know, some people have questioned why he didn't do this tour right after the convention like when he had that momentum going. can a bust to tour turn this around?
>> they seem to think so, but notice that just yesterday, the obama campaign announced that president obama is going to be in ohio on wednesday at bowling green and kent state . they really want to take some of the media coverage away from mitt romney because they've held this consistent lead in ohio now for months. it's about a four-point advantage for the president in the real clear politics average. and that ohio poll is very respected by many pollsters as being pretty accurate and a good predictor of where the electorate is right now. so romney has some ground to make up. but with the president going, it might be hard for him to do that.
>> alex , it's not just ohio . romney is losing almost every swing state , florida , colorado , pennsylvania. it looks like his path to victory is pretty small.
>> it does. and this is the heart of the electoral problem for romney . even if he were able to overtake the president in ohio , he would still have to then overtake him in florida , north carolina , colorado , iowa, a couple other places. the bottom line is because states like michigan and pennsylvania, which were competitive for president bush a couple years ago, because they're not competitive now, mitt romney really does need to win almost every swing state on the map in order to win this election.
>> i want to bring in bay buchanan , she is senior adviser to the romney campaign. bay, always good to have you on the program.
>> thanks, chris . good to be with you.
>> are we going to see anything new or different in ohio ? i mean, when you look at the polls and you look at where mitt romney stands in the swing states , you guys got a tough haul.
>> chris , i hate to disappoint you all, but anyone who knows anything about presidential politics or any politics knows four, five weeks is an eternity. anything can happen. no question, the polls are tight out there. nationally, we have a number of polls showing us within one or two. some showing us up. and our polls are showing us very, very tight. if you look at what happened last night in colorado , the governor had a rally out there. the place was packed. some people are telling me over 10,000 people showed up. enormous enthusiasm and excitement on our part. and our message is a clear one. not only does mitt romney have a plan to turn around this country, we cannot afford as americans four more years of this enormous debt, four more years of taxes and regulations that are crushing our businesses. we can't afford more americans on food stamps , chris . it's a clear message . we can't afford four more years of barack obama , and mitt romney can turn it around. it's a winning -- it's a winning message, very much so.
>> and as you well know, bay, and you and i have have both been out on the road with losing campaigns, and there's often a lot of enthusiasm. they're often able, if they have a decent ground organization in that area, to pack a haul and get people excited and screaming for the candidate. but here's the harsh reality . if barack obama wins ohio and virginia, two states where he is now leading, your guy would have to win florida , north carolina , iowa, nevada, wisconsin, colorado , new hampshire. the realities of the map are tough.
>> chris , you made an assumption that we're going to lose virginia and ohio . that is just not the case. ohio is in the margin of error. and if you look at a lot of these polls, they're overpolling democrats to push up the president's numbers. so you can say what you like, but there's no question winning campaigns have momentum and excitement underneath them. and that is what mitt romney 's have. we are filling our halls, let me say, and it's a very exciting message, and it's one that's in the best interests of america , and the number one issue in the country is jobs, jobs, jobs, and we know the president of the united states has no clue how to put america back to work. and mitt romney knows exactly how to do it.
>> i know you heard this, bay, but i want to play it for our viewers, what wisconsin everyogovernor scott walker said yesterday.
>> i want to see more passion. certainly in part it is a referendum on this president, there's no doubt about it. but i think for most americans , particularly in my state where there's an awful lot of swing independent voters, they want to know more than what's wrong with this president. they want to know what's right and what's going to move this country forward. i think mitt romney 's got that plan. i want to see fire in the belly and move forward.
>> that's the quote we were hearing ever since he said it, fire in the belly. does mitt romney have to show it? are we going to see it on this bus tour through ohio ?
>> chris , that's a good question. i think walker makes a point. there's no point that's what the american people want to see, determination and commitment they know in candidate has what it takes and is there to fight for them, and romney has it. you're going to see it out there. it's going to be a very strong emotional appeal to the american people to let them know i'm here to fight for you, to make certain we can turn the country around, get you off the food stamps that you now seem to require, just to take care of your own families, something that barack obama , a terrible legacy barack obama has given us.
>> we also saw mitt romney release his taxes on friday. he paid 14% 20011 tax return because he didn't take all of his deductions for charitable contributions, and we should say he gave a lot of money to charity. in july he told abc if he paid more taxes than he owed, i don't think i'd be qualified to become president. so did he just disqualify himself?
>> no, that's simple. he's always paid exactly what's been required by law. whatever his accountants said needed to be paid, he's written the check, no questions asked. and what happened this year is in january, he estimated -- there was an estimate accountants gave him as to what he'd be paying. when they finally did the tax return , they said sorry, governor romney , you're not paying that high. he said i told the people i was going to be paying that much, so that's what i'm going to take. it was just to make certain that that wasn't a misleading statement that he made in january. you know, this is what's interesting is last night what barack obama said on television, he actually said that the last ten days of the turmoil in the middle east was a bump in the road. chris , four americans were killed. four americans in a terrorist attack on our consulate. flags -- american flags are being burnt. and this is a bump in the road. it's time to start talking about barack obama and how he's completely clueless on foreign policy and the economy.
>> -- has taken a lot of hits for his behavior after what happened in benghazi including a lot of conservatives who thought he jumped the gun.
>> yes, chris , but why don't we talk now because that was two weeks ago.
>> you brought it up.
>> a president of the united states , last night, said this is a bump in the road who spent two weeks sending out his u.s. ambassador all about a video. is he still clueless as he is on foreign policy that he doesn't even understand that we have anti-american protests in the muslim world ? they're angry. we now have an egyptian president giving us orders as to how we are to act. this is an america that is no longer has the respect of the world. and that's what barack obama promised us. he said he's going to turn it around. he's failed and he's calling the death of americans a bump in the road. i would say it's outrageous, and it's time for the national media to start talking about that.
>> bay buchanan , always good to have you on the program. thank you very much.
>> thanks, chris .
>> back to our original point, alex , which is that we are going to be hearing -- and especially with the president tomorrow at the united nations , we have a clinton global initiative , so a lot of foreign affairs will be discussed there as well. is this something, though, that's going to resonate? how important might this be with voters?
>> oh, chris , i think it's an extremely important threshold that any presidential candidate needs to clear. i don't know that there are going to be a lot of voters who go into the voting booths making their final determination based on foreign policy .
>> what do you think about the argument bay just made about the president's comments last night?
>> well, i think that this has been sort of the pattern of the romney campaign over the last couple weeks. that they're not really introducing new policy ideas. it's not a new message, but they're trying to find moments where they think the president has tripped himself up a little bit and reintroduced their original points, in this case that the president has not been strong enough in dealing with north africa , the middle east , the muslim world in the context of what they perceive as an obama gaffe.
>> speaking of tripping up, the obama campaign can't get enough of the 47% gaffe by mitt romney , and they're releasing a new ad using that secret video. take a listen.
>> he won't release his tax returns before 2010 . maybe instead of attacking others on taxes, romney should come clean on his.
>> that's going to be a line we're going to be hearing, erin . is it effective?
>> it's effective in that the obama campaign will use it throughout tv ads. now, the romney campaign did do a good job of doing the friday news dump because we aren't talking about the tax returns as much today. instead a lot of the focus is on these " 60 minutes " interviews that the two candidates did last night. we are certainly going to hear more about this in campaign ads in the battleground states .
>> erin mcpike, alexander burns, good to see both of you, thanks.
>>> new this morning, a study on hispanic voters that could significantly affect the outcome of the november election. the study conducted by the advanced project says at least 10 million hispanic u.s. citizens in 23 states could be discouraged from voting because of these new voting laws. 16 states allow purging of suspected noncitizens from voter registration lists. more than 5.5 million registered hispanic voters live in those states, and nine states have passed restrictive photo i.d. laws. there are closing arguments in federal court today over south carolina 's new voter i.d. law. [ jack
>> a lot of republicans would like to know a lot of your donors would like to know how do you turn this thing around?
>> well, it doesn't need a turnaround. we've got a campaign which is tied with an incumbent president of the united states . i've got a very effective campaign. it's doing a very good job. but not everything i say is elegant, and i want to make it very clear, i want to help 100% of the american people .
>> in back-to-back interviews on " 60 minutes ," both candidates laid out their vision and admitted mistakes. romney said he spoke inelegantly. the president admitting he hadn't changed the culture in washington.
>> i'm the first one to confess that the spirit that i brought to washington, that i wanted to see instituted where we weren't constantly in a political slugfest but were focused more on problem solving , you know, i haven't fully accomplished that.
>> here's the brand-new politico/ george washington university battleground poll. the president has a slight lead over romney , and barring a major event, the window may be closing for romney to make inroads in those key battleground states . let me bring in real politics reporter erin pike and politico's alexander burns. good morning to both of you. erin , not only did mitt romney say his campaign doesn't need a turnaround, yet he said i want to be president of the 100%. is he, though, undoing some of the damage that he did with his 47% comments?
>> he's trying to. i think we'll see him try to do a lot more damage control as he campaigns through ohio this week. a lot of middle-class voters right there. and he'll be campaigning all the way through the state tuesday and wednesday. he's going to have to do a little bit more because the obama campaign continues to use this against him. they have a new ad out in ohio this morning that uses that 47% comment against him.
>> alex , romney went again after president obama for not meeting with benjamin netanyahu . mitt romney said he should be more specific about his own foreign policy , and listen to.
>> well, let's see what i've done since i came into office. i said i'd end the war in iraq . i did. i said that we'd go after al qaeda . they've been decimated in the fatah. that we'd go after bin laden . he's gone. so i've executed on my foreign policy , and it's one that the american people largely agree with. so, you know, if governor romney is suggesting that we should start another war, he should say so.
>> alex , what's he trying to do there?
>> well, first i think what the president is trying to do is, you know, there's been a very consistent critique of his performance on foreign policy from the right, that the obama administration has not been supportive enough of allies like israel, has not been assertive enough with iran. what obama 's trying to do is claim a sort of aggressive middle ground that would force romney in order to make that criticism of the white house , would force romney to take some positions that are just a little bit out of step with where americans are. americans , after iraq and afghanistan, there is a sense, i think, there's not a huge appetite for more military action overseas.
>> it is fascinating that we're talking so much about foreign affairs . i think a place we did not expect to be at this point in the campaign. let me go back to the domestic affairs. erin , you and i ohio girls, both.
>> we are.
>> different parts of the state. poll out this weekend shows the president is up five points. now, this is especially significant since -- well, no republican has won the white house without ohio . and take a look at the romney schedule for the next several days. you know, some people have questioned why he didn't do this tour right after the convention like when he had that momentum going. can a bust to tour turn this around?
>> they seem to think so, but notice that just yesterday, the obama campaign announced that president obama is going to be in ohio on wednesday at bowling green and kent state . they really want to take some of the media coverage away from mitt romney because they've held this consistent lead in ohio now for months. it's about a four-point advantage for the president in the real clear politics average. and that ohio poll is very respected by many pollsters as being pretty accurate and a good predictor of where the electorate is right now. so romney has some ground to make up. but with the president going, it might be hard for him to do that.
>> alex , it's not just ohio . romney is losing almost every swing state , florida , colorado , pennsylvania. it looks like his path to victory is pretty small.
>> it does. and this is the heart of the electoral problem for romney . even if he were able to overtake the president in ohio , he would still have to then overtake him in florida , north carolina , colorado , iowa, a couple other places. the bottom line is because states like michigan and pennsylvania, which were competitive for president bush a couple years ago, because they're not competitive now, mitt romney really does need to win almost every swing state on the map in order to win this election.
>> i want to bring in bay buchanan , she is senior adviser to the romney campaign. bay, always good to have you on the program.
>> thanks, chris . good to be with you.
>> are we going to see anything new or different in ohio ? i mean, when you look at the polls and you look at where mitt romney stands in the swing states , you guys got a tough haul.
>> chris , i hate to disappoint you all, but anyone who knows anything about presidential politics or any politics knows four, five weeks is an eternity. anything can happen. no question, the polls are tight out there. nationally, we have a number of polls showing us within one or two. some showing us up. and our polls are showing us very, very tight. if you look at what happened last night in colorado , the governor had a rally out there. the place was packed. some people are telling me over 10,000 people showed up. enormous enthusiasm and excitement on our part. and our message is a clear one. not only does mitt romney have a plan to turn around this country, we cannot afford as americans four more years of this enormous debt, four more years of taxes and regulations that are crushing our businesses. we can't afford more americans on food stamps , chris . it's a clear message . we can't afford four more years of barack obama , and mitt romney can turn it around. it's a winning -- it's a winning message, very much so.
>> and as you well know, bay, and you and i have have both been out on the road with losing campaigns, and there's often a lot of enthusiasm. they're often able, if they have a decent ground organization in that area, to pack a haul and get people excited and screaming for the candidate. but here's the harsh reality . if barack obama wins ohio and virginia, two states where he is now leading, your guy would have to win florida , north carolina , iowa, nevada, wisconsin, colorado , new hampshire. the realities of the map are tough.
>> chris , you made an assumption that we're going to lose virginia and ohio . that is just not the case. ohio is in the margin of error. and if you look at a lot of these polls, they're overpolling democrats to push up the president's numbers. so you can say what you like, but there's no question winning campaigns have momentum and excitement underneath them. and that is what mitt romney 's have. we are filling our halls, let me say, and it's a very exciting message, and it's one that's in the best interests of america , and the number one issue in the country is jobs, jobs, jobs, and we know the president of the united states has no clue how to put america back to work. and mitt romney knows exactly how to do it.
>> i know you heard this, bay, but i want to play it for our viewers, what wisconsin everyogovernor scott walker said yesterday.
>> i want to see more passion. certainly in part it is a referendum on this president, there's no doubt about it. but i think for most americans , particularly in my state where there's an awful lot of swing independent voters, they want to know more than what's wrong with this president. they want to know what's right and what's going to move this country forward. i think mitt romney 's got that plan. i want to see fire in the belly and move forward.
>> that's the quote we were hearing ever since he said it, fire in the belly. does mitt romney have to show it? are we going to see it on this bus tour through ohio ?
>> chris , that's a good question. i think walker makes a point. there's no point that's what the american people want to see, determination and commitment they know in candidate has what it takes and is there to fight for them, and romney has it. you're going to see it out there. it's going to be a very strong emotional appeal to the american people to let them know i'm here to fight for you, to make certain we can turn the country around, get you off the food stamps that you now seem to require, just to take care of your own families, something that barack obama , a terrible legacy barack obama has given us.
>> we also saw mitt romney release his taxes on friday. he paid 14% 20011 tax return because he didn't take all of his deductions for charitable contributions, and we should say he gave a lot of money to charity. in july he told abc if he paid more taxes than he owed, i don't think i'd be qualified to become president. so did he just disqualify himself?
>> no, that's simple. he's always paid exactly what's been required by law. whatever his accountants said needed to be paid, he's written the check, no questions asked. and what happened this year is in january, he estimated -- there was an estimate accountants gave him as to what he'd be paying. when they finally did the tax return , they said sorry, governor romney , you're not paying that high. he said i told the people i was going to be paying that much, so that's what i'm going to take. it was just to make certain that that wasn't a misleading statement that he made in january. you know, this is what's interesting is last night what barack obama said on television, he actually said that the last ten days of the turmoil in the middle east was a bump in the road. chris , four americans were killed. four americans in a terrorist attack on our consulate. flags -- american flags are being burnt. and this is a bump in the road. it's time to start talking about barack obama and how he's completely clueless on foreign policy and the economy.
>> -- has taken a lot of hits for his behavior after what happened in benghazi including a lot of conservatives who thought he jumped the gun.
>> yes, chris , but why don't we talk now because that was two weeks ago.
>> you brought it up.
>> a president of the united states , last night, said this is a bump in the road who spent two weeks sending out his u.s. ambassador all about a video. is he still clueless as he is on foreign policy that he doesn't even understand that we have anti-american protests in the muslim world ? they're angry. we now have an egyptian president giving us orders as to how we are to act. this is an america that is no longer has the respect of the world. and that's what barack obama promised us. he said he's going to turn it around. he's failed and he's calling the death of americans a bump in the road. i would say it's outrageous, and it's time for the national media to start talking about that.
>> bay buchanan , always good to have you on the program. thank you very much.
>> thanks, chris .
>> back to our original point, alex , which is that we are going to be hearing -- and especially with the president tomorrow at the united nations , we have a clinton global initiative , so a lot of foreign affairs will be discussed there as well. is this something, though, that's going to resonate? how important might this be with voters?
>> oh, chris , i think it's an extremely important threshold that any presidential candidate needs to clear. i don't know that there are going to be a lot of voters who go into the voting booths making their final determination based on foreign policy .
>> what do you think about the argument bay just made about the president's comments last night?
>> well, i think that this has been sort of the pattern of the romney campaign over the last couple weeks. that they're not really introducing new policy ideas. it's not a new message, but they're trying to find moments where they think the president has tripped himself up a little bit and reintroduced their original points, in this case that the president has not been strong enough in dealing with north africa , the middle east , the muslim world in the context of what they perceive as an obama gaffe.
>> speaking of tripping up, the obama campaign can't get enough of the 47% gaffe by mitt romney , and they're releasing a new ad using that secret video. take a listen.
>> he won't release his tax returns before 2010 . maybe instead of attacking others on taxes, romney should come clean on his.
>> that's going to be a line we're going to be hearing, erin . is it effective?
>> it's effective in that the obama campaign will use it throughout tv ads. now, the romney campaign did do a good job of doing the friday news dump because we aren't talking about the tax returns as much today. instead a lot of the focus is on these " 60 minutes " interviews that the two candidates did last night. we are certainly going to hear more about this in campaign ads in the battleground states .
>> erin mcpike, alexander burns, good to see both of you, thanks.
>>> new this morning, a study on hispanic voters that could significantly affect the outcome of the november election. the study conducted by the advanced project says at least 10 million hispanic u.s. citizens in 23 states could be discouraged from voting because of these new voting laws. 16 states allow purging of suspected noncitizens from voter registration lists. more than 5.5 million registered hispanic voters live in those states, and nine states have passed restrictive photo i.d. laws. there are closing arguments in federal court today over south carolina 's new voter i.d. law. [ jack