DNC chairwoman: Romney ‘most extreme’ on immigration

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) on Sunday dismissed the idea that sluggish job growth would discourage minority voters from the polls this November.

Wasserman Schultz, the chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, said that the policies of the presumptive GOP nominee, Mitt Romney, on issues like immigration reform would be even worse for minorities.

“When it comes to policies like immigration reform, Mitt Romney is the most extreme presidential candidate on immigration policy and that is why there is a 40-point deficit between him and President Obama among Hispanic-Americans,” Wasserman Schultz said on Fox News Sunday. 

She also said that African-Americans would have been “devastated” by Romney’s preference to not rescue the U.S. auto industry.

The Labor Department said Friday that the economy added only 80,000 jobs in June, and the unemployment rate stayed steady at 8.2 percent. But the unemployment rate for blacks was 14.4 percent, and stood around 11 percent for Hispanics.

Wasserman Schultz acknowledged, like President Obama on Friday, that the economy still has a ways to go. 

But, she added, “I am pretty happy about straight 28 months of job growth in the private sector.”

Reince Priebus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, later said those comments showed that Wasserman Schultz was living in a “fantasyland.”

The DNC chairman also got in a shot at Romney, for the long-discussed incident when Romney put his dog on his car’s roof during a trip. Wasserman Schultz had recently driven to New Hampshire with her family and four dogs.

“And all of the dogs were in the car. So I prove it can be done,” she said.

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