Via The Hill:
President Obama’s reelection campaign is returning fire after Mitt Romney’s new Web ad bashed White House support for green energy companies.
Obama campaign spokeswoman Lis Smith accused Romney of opposing renewable energy development while casting the president as fighting to stop the green energy market from going to China.
“As Governor, Romney called for a moratorium on offshore wind energy in Massachusetts, which would have severely hampered the development of that clean energy and impacted job growth across the state,” Smith said in a statement, referring to the planned Cape Wind project off the Massachusetts coast.
Smith also defended the embattled Energy Department loan program, noting its bipartisan roots, and other White House investments in alternative energy. The 2009 stimulus law steered tens of billions of dollars into various alternative energy and efficiency programs.
“President Obama’s investments in clean energy — along with the loan guarantee program established under the Bush administration that Romney now attacks — have supported 200,000 jobs in the clean energy sector and have helped bring our dependence on foreign oil to a 16-year low,” she said.
The Romney web video released Tuesday attacks the White House over the bankruptcy of the taxpayer-backed advanced solar panel manufacturing company Solyndra, and highlights financial headwinds facing other Energy Department-backed companies.