Obama Super Bowl Interview Calls Out Wall Street And The Super Rich

Last updated on August 10th, 2014 at 04:37 pm

President Obama used his Super Bowl interview to call on taxes to be raised on the wealthy, and more regulations on Wall Street.

Here’s the video from NBC Sports:

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After the president explained why he thought he deserved a second term, “I deserve a second term, but we’re not done. Look when you and I sat down, we were losing 750,000 jobs a month. In fact we had found out just a few days before we sat down, that we had lost that month 750,000 jobs. Now, we are creating 250,000. We created 3.7 million jobs in the last 23 months. We’ve created the most jobs since 2005, the most manufacturing jobs since 1990, but we’re not finished, and we’ve got to not only boost up American manufacturing so not just the auto industry, but all American manufacturing is building again and selling overseas. We’ve got to make sure that we’re pushing American energy, and that includes not just oil and gas, but clean energy.”

The president closed out his remarks with a reference to raising taxes on the wealthy, and a direct call for more regulations on Wall Street, “We’ve got to make sure that the skills of American workers are the best in the world, and we’re making progress on that front, and we’ve got to return to old fashioned American values. Everybody getting a fair shot, everybody doing their fair share, everybody playing by the same rules, and that means for example regulations to make sure that Wall Street is following the same rules that Main Street’s doing, but we’ve made progress and the key right now is just make sure we don’t start turning in a new direction that could throw that progress off.”

Full Obama Super Bowl Interview:

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If the Mitt Romneys and Wall Streets robbers thought that they were going to be able to enjoy Super Bowl Sunday, think again. Obama’s specific call out of Wall Street was a surprising bit of political strategy designed not only to appeal to the millions of Americans who were watching the pregame show, but it is also a bit of bait on the hook for Mitt Romney.

For you see, the Republican frontrunner can’t resist expressing his pride in how much money he has, and how he made it. The problem is that Romney made his fortune by gutting companies and killing jobs. Romney has shown a real weak spot for defending his wealth in the past, and I suspect the specific call out of Wall Street was a bit of General Election positioning by the president.

Raising taxes on the wealthy and cracking down on Wall Street are two of the most popular political positions in the country, and the president’s likely fall opponent is on the wrong side of popular opinion on both.

President Obama used a brief interview on Super Bowl Sunday to get the message out to lots of Americans who are not political junkies that he is on their side. Obama delivered his message loud and clear, and made the wealthiest Americans and Wall Street home wreckers’ Sunday a little less Super.

Jason Easley

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.

Awards and  Professional Memberships

Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association