Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) wasted no time turning a Hillary Clinton remark about jobs into a laugh line on the campaign trail.
Republicans seized on the remark last week when, in a speech denouncing "trickle down" economics, the former secretary of state said, "Don't let anybody tell you that it's corporations and businesses that create jobs." Three days later, however, Clinton was back on the trail to take another stab at an argument popularized by progressive Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.).
"Let me be absolutely clear about what I've been saying for a couple of decades: Our economy grows when businesses and entrepreneurs create good-paying jobs here in an America where workers and families are empowered to build from the bottom up and the middle out -- not when we hand out tax breaks for corporations that outsource jobs or stash their profits overseas," she said.
But one quote was enough for Paul, who, like Clinton, has been making moves toward a future presidential run.
Addressing supporters of vulnerable Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) in Wichita on Tuesday, the Kentucky Republican likened the remark to President Barack Obama's "You didn't build that" comment that Republicans eventually turned into a theme at the 2012 presidential nominating convention. Like Clinton, Obama was laying out the progressive case that businesses owe some of their success to the efforts of government.
"The president says, you didn't build that, it just sort of happened," Paul said, according to BuzzFeed. "The plane just sort of came into being because it was a public road and a public library."
"Hillary Clinton comes up and she says, 'Businesses don't create jobs.' Anybody here think businesses don't create jobs?" Paul added. "I'm here today to endorse Pat Roberts and [Kansas Gov.] Sam Brownback, because you know what? They know that businesses do create jobs, and I hope you know that too."
Paul again tested the attack at another Roberts campaign stop in Overland Park, telling an adoring crowd, "Hillary Clinton says, 'Well, businesses don't create jobs.' Anybody believe that?"
This isn't the first time Paul has turned his sights on Clinton. He rarely delivers a speech without turning her record on the Benghazi terror attacks, Libya, Iraq or climate change into a punch line. But it could be the opening salvo of a future line of attack -- one that failed for GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney in 2012 -- should Clinton decide to run for president.
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