Will Romney's views on welfare moms haunt him?

Mitt Romney says raising children is work. But does he have different rules for wealthy stay-at-home moms — like his wife, Ann — and struggling low-income moms?

As Mitt Romney tries to win over women voters, an old comment he made about welfare moms needing "the dignity of work" comes back to bite him.
(Image credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

The partisan battle over working moms continues. Mitt Romney and his supporters last week pounced on Democratic consultant Hilary Rosen for saying Romney's wife, Ann, didn't understand economic issues facing American women because she "never worked a day in her life." Team Romney said the acid remark, for which Rosen apologized, showed that Democrats had declared "war on moms" by suggesting that raising children isn't work. But MSNBC's Chris Hayes dug up video of the GOP presidential candidate saying in January that he wanted to require women who receive welfare to get a job — even if they have toddlers in the home — so they'll know the "dignity of work." Does this effectively kill Romney's argument that he's the one standing up for stay-at-home moms?

Yes, this makes Romney look two-faced: After the Republican Party drummed up "the totally fake controversy about 'stay-at-home moms'", this clip of Mitt Romney is "pretty devastating," says Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs. Romney stands up for his privileged wife's toil at home, but he sings a different tune when the mom in question is someone struggling to make ends meet. Apparently, Romney's GOP is "on the side of stay-at-home mothers, as long as they're rich."

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