Republican U.S. presidential candidate Mitt Romney criticized President Barack Obama's jobs record in a key swing state Thursday by spotlighting a closed factory that Obama once touted as a symbol of economic hope.
Taking aim at an issue that could be Obama's key vulnerability in the 2012 election, Romney launched a 40-second Web video blaming the Democratic president's economic policies for 100,000 job losses in Pennsylvania and the total of 470,000 jobless workers in the northeastern state.
The video, coming on a day when both Romney and Obama were due to visit Pennsylvania, focuses on the Allentown Metal Works that closed in January, just over a year after Obama visited the plant to tout his economic stimulus efforts.
Romney was due to hold a news conference at the factory site Thursday.
The U.S. economy and joblessness are considered among Obama's main weaknesses in his re-election effort. Romney is leading in opinion polls among the candidates seeking the Republican 2012 presidential nomination to face Obama.
Romney, a former Massachusetts governor and businessman, is trying to promote himself as an economics-savvy jobs creator.
Obama's victory in Pennsylvania in 2008 was instrumental in his presidential election victory. The state could be pivotal again in his 2012 re-election campaign.
The state has recently shown signs of favoring Republicans, partly as a result of the conservative Tea Party movement that helped Republican Pat Toomey win election to the U.S. Senate in 2010.