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Biden Gaffe Alert: Declares stimulus a success for Missouri factory despite layoffs

June 9, 2009

JEFFERSON CITY—On Monday, Vice President Joe Biden committed a major gaffe while conducting a conference call with reporters to tout the so-called successes of the federal stimulus package. Biden specifically cited a Jefferson City-based manufacturer, claiming that the business is thriving again thanks to the federal stimulus. But according to last Thursday’s Jefferson City News-Tribune, the company announced that it was laying off 25 more workers. Since 2008, they have cut 300 of their original 900 employees.

“Days after this company announced 25 additional layoffs, Joe Biden cited it as an example of how the stimulus was producing results across the nation. Biden should ask one of the newly-unemployed workers or their families how successful the stimulus package has been in saving or creating jobs,” said Lloyd Smith, Executive Director of the Missouri Republican Party. “His attempt to sugarcoat the Obama Administration’s borrow, tax, and spend record comes despite worsening unemployment and mounting debt—with no end in sight”

Biden is also taking heat for another gaffe on the conference call—mistakenly claiming that a new train tunnel between Manhattan and New Jersey would accommodate automobiles.
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Post-Dispatch, June 8: Biden’s point was that the Recovery Act (White House folks don’t call it the stimulus) is creating jobs as well as renewable energy. He was referring to the purchase of 100 transformers (which convert wind to electricity) from ABB Inc. of Jefferson City. The vice president visited ABB during a trip to Missouri in April. “There’s a transformer factory in Missouri that was in real trouble,” Biden said, “but because of tax credits made available for a wind farm, orders for transformers are up … People are making decent wages.”

Jefferson City News-Tribune, June 4: Another 25 jobs are being cut at ABB as the housing market continues to stagger… Boyle confirmed the Jefferson City plant did land a contract to build transformers for wind farm turbines, but so far that is the only thing they have been able to get through the Green Energy portion of the federal economic stimulus program. At the start of last year, the Jefferson City ABB plant had a workforce of over 900, but with various layoffs announced since that time that number is down to around 600.

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