President Obama weighed in Thursday on the kerfuffle over Democratic strategist Hilary Rosen's recent comments, saying that "there's no tougher job than being a mom."
"Anybody who would argue otherwise, I think, probably needs to rethink their statement," Obama told Bruce Aune of ABC's Cedar Rapids affiliate KCRG.
On Wednesday evening, Rosen, once an employee of the Huffington Post, claimed that Ann Romney, wife of GOP frontrunner Mitt Romney, had "never worked a day in her life," referring to whether she understood women's economic struggles. The comments came amid an ongoing spat between the Obama and Romney campaigns about which candidate has the best record on women.
Ann Romney responded with her take on Thursday, painting Rosen's comment as a claim that being a mother wasn't actually "work."
"She should have come to my house when those five boys were causing trouble," said Romney, laughing, "it wasn't so easy."
Obama told KCRG that he doesn't "have a lot of patience for commentary about the spouses of political candidates" such as Ann Romney.
"I don’t know if she necessarily volunteered for this job so, you know, we don’t need to be directing comments at them," he said. "I think me and Governor Romney are going to have more than enough to argue about during the course of this campaign.”
Rosen has since apologized and called for an end to the "faux war," but that hasn't stopped the Republican National Committee from seizing on the issue with a "Moms Do Work" campaign.
"Mrs. Romney, I applaud your decision to stay home and raise what are obviously five wonderful boys. This is not about stay-at-home moms versus working moms," Rosen said on CNN.
"I think your husband needs to stand up for women's economic struggles and so far we have not seen how he's going to do that on the campaign trail," she continued. "It hasn't come out of his mouth and maybe it will at some point, but this is a distraction that his campaign is forcing on the American people to avoid his record on the issues."
While some have argued that the flareup is a non-issue, many members of the Democratic party and Obama campaign have been quick to distance themselves from Rosen's comments.
Even First Lady Michelle Obama issued a comment, apparently in response to Rosen's claim.
"Every mother works hard, and every woman deserves to be respected," she tweeted Thursday.