9:57 am Aug. 7, 2012
In a new ad released this morning, the Obama-supporting super PAC Priorities USA released what is probably its harshest attack yet on Mitt Romney's business career at Bain Capital.
In the ad, titled "Understands," Joe Soptic describes the effects on his family after Bain closed his GST Steel plant in Kansas, and wonders if his wife postponed treatment for the cancer that took her life because the family lacked health insurance after the plant closed.
Soptic says his wife passed away 22 days after being diagnosed.
"I do not think Mitt Romney realizes what he’s done to anyone, and furthermore I do not think Mitt Romney is concerned," he says in closing.
Soptic previously appeared in a two-minute ad produced by the Obama campaign, as one of a handful of voices talking about the closure of the Kansas City plant.
As an unofficial arm of the Obama campaign, Priorities has taken on the responsibility of running some of the toughest Bain-related ads against Romney, often focusing on the stories of workers who were employed by shuttered Bain acquisitions. "Understands" is the fifth in a series that the super PAC has invested $20 million to air in swing states, and Priorities officials insist they are having an impact, despite some skepticism from media and pundits outside the swing states.
In one prior ad, a worker describes building a stage for the announcement that the factory would be closing, which he likened to building his own coffin.
