White House: 2014 Election Is ‘Not a Referendum on Obama’

‘The important thing here is what’s driving the voters’ decisions’

EARNEST: “Well, Jim, I think as your own poll that I said earlier indicates, it is not. The fact is the voters -- again, the voters who always pick up the phone to talk to people who are conducting a poll for CNN indicated that at least a majority of them were not trying to send the message to the president with their vote, that something else was driving their decision.”
ACOSTA: “I’m sure that the American people would see the country moving in the wrong direction —“
EARNEST: “Yes, but it’s hard to discount the CNN polls, isn’t it? [crosstalk] Probably tougher for you than for me, but —“
ACOSTA: “They did a really good polling here, no question about it.”
EARNEST: “It’s true.”
ACOSTA: “But you can surely pick certain metrics, but the American people do believe that the country is moving in the wrong direction. President had 6 years to get the country moving in the right direction, and you have a lot of Republican candidates in some pretty key states, the states that president won, who were running against the president. They are not running so much against the candidate on the other side of the aisle, they are running against the president. Isn’t that fair to say?”
EARNEST: “Again, I think you have to look at what the vote — I think what the important thing here is is what’s driving the voters decisions and folks at CNN who did some good work on this have obviously entered some data on this. I think there will be more data in the form of exit polls tonight that will give us greater insight into what’s driving the vote. I don’t think it’s a particularly controversial notion to cite that most voter I think are deciding who to vote for based on the name that’s on the ballot, not the name that’s not. That said, the president has sought to support Democratic candidates, particularly those who share his view that policies benefiting middle class families should be at the top of the agenda. That stands in pretty stark contrast to the approach that’s been taken by a lot of the Republicans, they have a [indecipherable] that’s different. They think that policy making should be geared toward driving benefits to those at the top with the expectation that people lower down the total ball will benefit... I think that most Democratic candidates across the country agree with that general philosophy. Some might describe it differently, but I think it does — visions are pretty consistent and that’s why the president has worked so hard to benefit Democratic candidates in states all across the country ... in some states where the president did not do well in presidential elections and in some states where the president did pretty well in the presidential elections. And it’s been up to those individual candidates, those Democratic candidates, to make decisions for themselves how best the president’s support can be used to their benefit in the elections.”

 

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