LA CROSSE, Wis. -- President Barack Obama said Thursday that despite unemployment falling to a seven-year low, there is more work to do to increase Americans' wages.
Obama traveled to Wisconsin to tout a Labor Department proposal that would make more salaried workers eligible for overtime pay. The move is strongly supported by labor unions, traditional Democratic allies that parted with Obama over his push for a free-trade pact with Asia-Pacific countries.
The president was greeted at the airport by Republican Gov. Scott Walker, who teased his expected entry into the 2016 presidential race on social media. Walker made a national name for himself by fighting labor unions. By landing in Wisconsin, Obama signaled his solidarity with organized labor.
Obama said there's more to be done to increase workers' wages despite the U.S. unemployment rate hitting a seven-year low of 5.3 percent in June. He said the overtime rule would help by making up to 5 million more people eligible for pay at the rate of time-and-a-half.
Obama said his administration's focus on reviving U.S. manufacturing, spending on education and cutting taxes is boosting America's middle class. The Republican philosophy of giving breaks to the wealthy in hopes that benefits will "trickle down" to others doesn't work, he said, adding that the proof was "right here in Wisconsin."
Without naming Walker, Obama criticized his economic policies, listing the repeal of a statewide fair pay law, Walker's clashes with labor unions and education spending cuts.
He compared Wisconsin with neighboring Minnesota, where the Democratic governor has increased taxes on higher incomes and moved to raise the minimum wage and expand Medicaid coverage.
"According to the Republican theory, all that kind of stuff would have been bad for the economy. But Minnesota's unemployment rate is lower than Wisconsin's. Minnesota's median income is around $9,000 higher. ... Minnesota's winning this border battle."
He promoted his brand of middle-class economics by drawing contrasts with "mean" Republicans.
"They're good people," Obama said of Republicans. "It's just their ideas are bad."
Obama leveled some of his sharpest criticism of Republicans on the issue of health care a week after the Supreme Court upheld a key component of the law and Obama declared it "here to stay."
Republicans in Congress have cast dozens of votes to repeal the law, and they have vowed to keep trying.
"Every single one of them is still obsessed with repealing the Affordable Care Act, despite the fact that by every measure it's working," Obama said. "It just seems a little mean to say that you don't want to provide coverage" to millions of people who've gained it under the law "and you got nothing to replace it with."
"That's a bad idea," the president said.
Republicans countered that Obama was resorting to attacks because he's the one short on good ideas.
Walker posted on Twitter after Obama had departed: "Looks like Obama & TheDemocrats are after me again but recent history shows they're in for a fight."
A Section on 07/03/2015