President Barack Obama, trying to hold back Mitt Romney's apparent inroads with women voters, campaigns on Friday in Virginia alongside Planned Parenthood Action Fund chief Cecile Richards. Richards also stars in this new Web video in support of the campaign.
Democrats have reacted with alarm to recent polls suggesting Romney has sharply narrowed the "gender gap"—Obama's advantage with women, a key pillar of his re-election strategy. They have seized on, notably, the former Massachusetts governor's vow to overturn Roe v. Wade and his pledge to deny federal funding to Planned Parenthood.
"Since Day One, President Obama has stood with women," Richards says in the video, which includes Obama interacting with smiling women. She also underlines that the first bill the president signed into law was a measure to enable women to better battle pay discrimination.
"Mitt Romney, on the other hand, is threatening not just to take us back four years, but more than 40 years," Richards says.
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Interestingly, the video focuses on Florida, showcasing volunteers in that state and featuring Richards telling Obama supporters "as Florida goes, so goes the country."
Romney campaign spokeswoman Amanda Henneberg countered that the Obama campaign was trying "to distract from the president's lack of an agenda for a second term.
"Five-and-a-half million women are struggling to find work in the Obama economy, and they are suffering from record unemployment under this president," she said. "Women can't afford four more years of the same."
Richards will introduce Obama at a rally at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va., on Friday. The president then heads to Camp David to prepare for his third and final debate with Romney on Monday, a session focused on foreign policy.