From left, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and businessman Herman Cain are seen on stage during the first New Hampshire Republican presidential debate at St. Anselm College in Manchester, N.H., Monday, June 13, 2011. (AP Photo/Jim Cole)

Republican Presidential Debate In New Hampshire pt.2

KING: Governor Romney, just yesterday, Governor Pawlenty, who is to your left on the stage tonight, called your Massachusetts plan, which you know has become a focal point of the criticism in this campaign from your friends here, Obamneycare, Obamneycare. Is that a fair comparison?

ROMNEY: You know, let me say a couple things. First, if I’m elected president, I will repeal Obamacare, just as Michelle indicated. And also, on my first day in office, if I’m lucky enough to have that office, I will grant a waiver to all 50 states from Obamacare.

Now, there’s some similarities and there are some big differences. Obamacare spends a trillion dollars. If it were perfect — and it’s not perfect, it’s terrible — we can’t afford more federal spending.

Secondly, it raises $500 billion in taxes. We didn’t raise taxes in Massachusetts.

Third, Obamacare takes $500 billion out of Medicare and funds Obamacare. We, of course, didn’t do that.

And, finally, ours was a state plan, a state solution, and if people don’t like it in our state, they can change it. That’s the nature of why states are the right place for this type of responsibility. And that’s why I introduced a plan to repeal Obamacare and replace it with a state-centric program.

KING: Governor, you just heard the governor rebut your characterization, Obamneycare. Why?

PAWLENTY: Well, let me first say to Sylvia, she has put her finger on one of the most important issues facing the country, which is President Obama stood before the nation in 2008 and said he promised to do health care reform focused on cost containment, along with Republicans, he’d do it on a bipartisan basis…

KING: The question — the question, Governor, was, why Obamneycare?

PAWLENTY: That’s right. Well, I’m going to get to that, John.

KING: You have 30 seconds, Governor.

PAWLENTY: Yeah, so we — this is another example of him breaking his promise, and he has to be held accountable. And in order to prosecute the case against President Obama, you have to be able to show that you’ve got a better plan and a different plan. We took a different approach in Minnesota. We didn’t use top-down government mandates and individual requirements from government. We created market alternatives and empowered consumers. I think that’s the way to fix health care in the United States of America.

KING: And you don’t want to address why you called Governor Romney’s Obamneycare?

PAWLENTY: Well, the issue that was raised in a question from a reporter was, what are the similarities between the two? And I just cited President Obama’s own words that he looked to Massachusetts as a blueprint or a guide when he designed Obamacare.

KING: But you chose — you say you were asked a question, which is fair enough, but you chose those words. And so one of my questions is, why would you chose those — choose those words maybe in the comfort of a Sunday show studio? Your rival is standing right there. If it was Obamneycare on “Fox News Sunday,” why isn’t it not Obamneycare standing here with the governor right there?

PAWLENTY: It — President Obama is — is the person who I quoted in saying he looked to Massachusetts for designing his program. He’s the one who said it’s a blueprint and that he merged the two programs. And so using the term “Obamneycare” was a reflection of the president’s comments that he designed Obamacare on the Massachusetts health care plan.

KING: All right.

Governor, you want to respond to that at all?

ROMNEY: No, just — just to say this, which is my guess is the president is going to eat those words and wish he hasn’t — hadn’t put them out there. And I can’t wait to debate him and say, Mr. President, if, in fact, you did look at what we did in Massachusetts, why didn’t you give me a call and ask what worked and what didn’t? And I would have told you, Mr. President, that what you’re doing will not work.

It’s a huge power grab by the federal government. It’s going to be massively expensive, raising taxes, cutting Medicare. It’s wrong for America. And that’s why there’s an outpouring across the nation to say no to Obamacare. And I’m delighted to be able to debate him on that.

KING: OK. Mr. Speaker…

(CROSSTALK)

KING: … you have a — I’ll let you — Mr. Speaker, you have at times said, you know, maybe you do have a consider a mandate. You’ve been very open to the individual mandate. It has become, it seems, at least at the moment, a litmus test in this Republican primary. Should it be?

GINGRICH: Yes, it should be. If you — if you explore the mandate, which even the Heritage Foundation at one time looked at, the fact is, when you get into an mandate, it ultimately ends up with unconstitutional powers. It allows the government to define virtually everything. And if you can do it for health care, you can do it for everything in your life, and, therefore, we should not have a mandate.

But I want to answer Sylvia at a different level. This campaign cannot be only about the presidency. We need to pick up at least 12 seats in the U.S. Senate and 30 or 40 more seats in the House, because if you are serious about repealing Obamacare, you have to be serious about building a big enough majority in the legislative branch that you could actually in the first 90 days pass the legislation.

So I just think it’s very important to understand, it’s not about what one person in America does. It’s about what the American people do. And that requires a senatorial majority, as well as a presidency.

KING: All right. We’ll have more time to discuss the health care issue. Let’s get down to the floor.

Jennifer Vaughn from WMUR has a question from a voter.

VAUGHN: Hi, John. Thank you very much. I’d like you to meet Terry Pfaff tonight. Tell me I said that last name correctly, Terry. Granite Stater born and bred?

TERRY PFAFF, FORMER NEW HAMPSHIRE STATE SENATE CANDIDATE: Yes, ma’am.

VAUGHN: Thank you for being here. And what’s your question for the candidates tonight?

PFAFF: Well, my question is that I am a New Hampshire native and I’ve been an active Republican for years from a town committee chairman, Republican chairman, Merrimack County, vice chairman, all the way up to 2004 delegate for President Bush.

My question is, how will you convince myself? I’m not a libertarian Republican, I’m not a Tea Party Republican. I’m just a mainstream Republican. And we need both — the independents and mainstream Republicans to win in November.

How can you convince me and assure me that you’ll bring a balance and you won’t be torn to one side or the other for many factions within the party? You have to have a balanced approach to governing to solve our serious problems.

KING: Senator Santorum, let me go to you first on that one.

SANTORUM: Well, if you look at my record, I’m someone who’s actually accomplished a lot on big issues. Take for example welfare reform. I was in the United States Senate and actually at the direction of Newt Gingrich I was on the Ways and Means Committee and I drafted the Contract with America Welfare Reform Bill.

It was considered this extreme measure. Well, that extreme measure we ended up winning an election and getting those seats. And that was now the starting point. And I managed that bill in the United States Senate because I cared about the dignity of every person.

I didn’t believe that poverty was the ultimate disability. I believed that people could work and they could succeed. And we brought people together. I got 70 votes to end a federal entitlement — to end a federal entitlement which was what Paul Ryan’s proposed for Medicaid, he’s proposed for food stamps, he’s proposed for other welfare programs.

We did it. We set the template, and I led and got bipartisan support to do it.

KING: Can I ask you quickly now? That wasn’t — addressed part of the question. But are you concerned at all about the influence of the Tea Party?

SANTORUM: Not at all. I think the Tea Party is a great backstop for America. I love it when people hold up this Constitution and say we have to live by what our founders laid out for this country. It is absolutely essential that we have that backbone to the Republican Party going into this election.

KING: I know you agree, Congresswoman. So help the gentleman. Address his concerns that the Tea Party somehow — the influence of the Tea Party somehow pushes him out?

BACHMANN: Terry, what I’ve seen in the Tea Party — I’m the chairman of the Tea Party Caucus in the House of Representatives. And what I’ve seen is unlike how the media has tried to wrongly and grossly portray the Tea Party, the Tea Party is really made up of disaffected Democrats, independents, people who’ve never been political a day in their life.

People who are libertarians, Republicans. It’s a wide swath of America coming together. I think that’s why the left fears it so much. Because they’re people who simply want to take the country back. They want the country to work again.

And I think there’s no question, Terry, this election will be about economics. It will be about how will we create jobs, how will we turn the economy around, how will we have a pro-growth economy.

That’s a great story for Republicans to tell. President Obama can’t tell that story. His report card right now has a big failing grade on it, but Republicans have an awesome story to tell.

We need every one of us in a three-legged stool. We need the peace through strength of Republicans, we need the fiscal conservatives, we need the social conservatives. We need everybody to come together because we’re going to win. Just make no mistake about it.

I want to announce tonight. President Obama is a one-term president.

(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)

BACHMANN: You’ll win.

KING: I’m being polite so far. But I want to remind everybody about the time.

Mr. Cain, as somebody who has no elective no experience.

CAIN: Yes.

KING: To this gentleman’s question. If you were to become the nominee of this party.

CAIN: Yes.

KING: And you associate yourself with the Tea Party, politics is about math. It’s about coalition building. And a candidate who loses a mainstream Republican as he describes himself might not win this state in November. Might not win a big state like Senator Santorum’s Pennsylvania in November.

Address the concern of the gentleman who seems to think that at least some people in the Tea Party maybe in their dissatisfaction, their anger of the president are too negative, too critical.

CAIN: They’re not too negative and they’re not too critical. As a businessman, one of the first things that you do, which has allowed me to be successful throughout my career is make sure you’re working on the right problem. If we make sure we’re working on the right problem, I will surround myself with the right people and then we will put together the right plans that I’m going to take it to the people. I will be a president to do what’s right, not what’s politically right.

And so if the other party disagrees but the American people embrace those common sense solutions, that’s how we get things done. So those experiences in the business world, managing large organizations with a very diverse constituency are the same skills that can help get the people involved and not exclude the people like this administration has done.

KING: I want to remind the candidates, though, this as I remind people in the audience. CNN is hosting a Tea Party debate September 12th. So watch how this plays out. The Tea Party was a vocal in 2010. We’ll see how much the influence is in 2012.

Let’s continue our conversation here with the voters of New Hampshire.

Jean Mackin of WMUR is in Hancock with a voter and a question — Jean.

JEAN MACKIN, WMUR: Thanks very much, John. And welcome to the Hancock Inn. I’m standing here with Mike Patinsky. He is a small business owner from Harris Field, New Hampshire.

And Mike, what question do you have tonight?

MIKE PATINSKY, DIRECTOR OF TRANSPORTATION, FRANKLIN PIERCE COLLEGE: Well, for the candidates I’d like to know how they plan on returning manufacturing jobs to the United States.

KING: Congressman Paul, why don’t you start with that one?

PAUL: Pretty important because everything we’ve done in the last 20 or 30 years we’ve exported our jobs. And when you have a reserve currency of the world and you abuse it, you export money. That becomes the main export so it goes with the money.

You have to invite capital. The way you get capital into a country, you have to have a strong currency, not a weak currency. Today it’s a deliberate job of the Federal Reserve to weaken the currency. We should invite capital back.

First thing is, we have trillions of dollars, at least over a trillion dollars of U.S. money made overseas, but it stays over there because if you bring it home, they get taxed. If you want to, we need to get the Fed to quit printing the money and if you want capital, you have to entice those individuals to repatriate their money and take the taxes office, set up a financial system, deregulate and de-tax to invite people to go back to work again.

But as long as we run a program of deliberately weakening our currency, our jobs will go overseas, and that is what’s happened for a good many years, especially in the last decade. KING: Governor Pawlenty, does the congressman have it right?

PAWLENTY: There’s a number of things we need to do. Restore manufacturing in this country. And I grew up if in a meat packing town. I grew up in a manufacturing town. I was in a union for six or seven years.

I understand what it’s like to see the blue-collar communities and the struggles that they’ve had when manufacturing leaves. So I’ve seen that firsthand. But number one, we’ve got to have fair trade, and what’s going on right now is not fair.

I’m for a fair and open trade but I’m not for being stupid and I’m not for being a chump. And we have individuals and organizations and countries around this world who are not following the rules when it comes to fair trade. We need a stronger president and somebody who’s going to take on those issues.

Number two, we need to make the costs and burdens of manufacturing in this country lower. We’re asking them to climb the mountain with a big backsack full of rocks on their back. We have to take the rocks out.

One of them is Obamacare. I mean somebody in Arizona the other day. He’s moving his whole company out of the country just because of Obamacare. The taxes are too high. The regulations are too heavy, the permitting is too slow, and the message everywhere around this country, from business leaders large and small, including manufacturing, is get the government off my back. As president I will.

KING: How about to help workers, Congressman, get ready for the new jobs in manufacturing? Should the United States government, the federal government we say help in community colleges with their vocational training programs and things like that?

BACHMANN: Well, the United States federal government and the states have done numerous job training programs over the year with mixed results. This is what we need to do to turn job creation around and bring manufacturing back to the United States.

What we need to do is today the United States has the second highest corporate tax rate in the world. I’m a former federal tax lawyer. I’ve seen the devastation. We’ve got to bring that tax rate down substantially so that we’re among the lowest in the industrialized world.

Here’s the other thing. Every time the liberals get into office, they pass an omnibus bill of big spending projects. What we need to do is pass the mother of all repeal bills, but it’s the repeal bill that will get a job killing regulations. And I would begin with the EPA, because there is no other agency like the EPA. It should really be renamed the job-killing organization of America.

KING: OK. OK. I’ll get to you in one second. I just want to show people. We’re asking people watching at home also to tell us on Facebook, in Twitter what concerns them.

If you watch up here and take a look. Just look what’s happened. Three most important issues this election season regardless of party, jobs, the jobless, and whether you want a job.

Senator Santorum, your state of Pennsylvania, a big industrial state that has struggled in recent years.

SANTORUM: I always am from Pennsylvania. We still make things there, and I represented the Steel Valley of Pittsburgh when I was in the Congress. And what I learned from growing up in Butler, Pennsylvania, steel town is that the broad middle of America was a broad middle of America when we had lots of manufacturing here because that’s how the wealth from those who create the jobs get down.

And we’ve been outsourcing those jobs. So what we need to do is a lot of what was said here. I would add another thing that I’m specifically proposing. We need to cut the capital gains tax in half which others have proposed but for manufacturers we need to give a five-year window where we cut it to zero.

We want to encourage people to set up jobs here in America. Take that R&D credit, make it permanent, take that innovation and then invest that money here to create that broad middle of America and have that wealth really trickle down.

KING: Let’s stay on jobs and the economy. We’ll get to everybody. Just want to bring in Josh McElveen from WMUR who’s down there on the floor. He has a question related to this.

JOSH MCELVEEN, WMUR POLITICAL REPORTER: Thank you, John. Good evening, candidates.