Boeing,  Mitt Romney,  President 2012

President 2012: Mitt Romney Delivers Labor Policy Speech – Backs Boeing

Paul Munsch is the owner of St. Louis Paving in St. Louis, Missouri. He and his employees have faced years of bullying by the union bosses with whom President Obama continues to side.

GOP Presidential candidate Mitt Romney delivered a labor policy speech this morning in South Carolina before heading to Tampa, Florida for tonight’s GOP Presidential debate.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) invoked aerospace giant Boeing in his labor policy speech Monday as an example of the type of American innovation he would encourage as president.

Romney used the opportunity to hit President Obama on his labor policies, highlighting what he called the “egregious example” of the president’s failed policies in South Carolina.

Romney toured Boeing’s new South Carolina plant prior to the speech, a strong indication of his commitment to stand with South Carolina in the dispute between that state and the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), an independent federal agency. The board is suing Boeing for allegedly moving the plant from Washington state in retaliation for labor strikes there.

“It’s an assault on business, it’s an assault on jobs, it’s an assault on states that have right-to-work policies,” Romney said of the NLRB suit.

On Monday, Romney also named William Kilberg, the lead counsel for Boeing in the ongoing dispute, as a co-chairman of his Labor Policy Advisory Group. Kilberg will help “shape the policies I am proposing to return power from the labor bosses to the workers and businesses that can get our economy going again,” Romney said in a statement.

“Boeing, when they decided where they were going to build their new expansion facility, chose South Carolina, chose America,” Romney said in the speech. “The folks that are their No. 1 competitor, Airbus, chose China for their expansion. … Boeing did the right thing. Boeing should not be punished for doing the right thing. Boeing should be celebrated and encouraged.”

The issue has become important in key state South Carolina, where Gov. Nikki Haley (R) has repeatedly called on Obama, along with the Republican presidential candidates, to state his position on the lawsuit.

This Boeing flap in South Carolina WILL be an issue in the general election. I can see the political ads already flying in the key battleground states.

President Obama is likely to allow the NLRB vacancies go unfilled and thus any further NLRB action to avoid any further political embarrassment from his friends in Big Labor.