Remarks at a Campaign Event in Las Vegas, Nevada

Thank you so much. [cheers and applause] Now that's a Las Vegas welcome. Thank you! [cheers and applause]

Boy, that warms the heart. Thank you so much. What an honor to be here with you and to have you welcome me like this. I know this is not just for me just for our party; this is for America. We're taking it back. [cheers and applause]

What an honor to be introduced by Colonel Anton . I appreciate his service in our military. I appreciate the men and women who serve in our military and have served in our military. [cheers and applause]

Today is National POW/MIA Recognition Day, a day that we remember those who've served our nation and not come home. We will keep them in our hearts and in our prayers forever.

We love them. We appreciate them. We want them to come home and be with their families and with a country that loves them and a country they love dearly. Thank you. [cheers and applause]

I am honored to be joined by your lieutenant governor, who is today governor because Governor Sandoval is over in China doing some work, getting customers to come here to Las Vegas. And so right over here is Governor Brian Krolicki, Governor Krolicki. Thank you. [cheers and applause]

And as you know, Congressman Heck would be here, but Congressman Heck is serving in the military. He's a member of the Reserves, and he can't be here because of his service. His wife, Lisa, is here somewhere. [cheers and applause] Thank you, Lisa. Right here. Thank you, Lisa.

And our — our hearts are also heavy as we recognize that Tyrone Woods, a hero who stood up to protect his fellows in Libya, lost his life, a Nevadan, a Las Vegan, who — who has lost his life. He left three children and a wife behind. May our hearts and prayers be turned to her and to their family as well. Thank you. [cheers and applause]

Now we have some work to do. Yeah, sit down. Go ahead. That's right. [laughter]

You have some work to do, all right? Because you've got to make sure and elect me president in November. We're going to get that job done. [cheers and applause]

You see — you see, President — President Obama raised up the — the white flag of surrender again yesterday. He — [booing] — he said you can't change Washington from the inside; you have to do it from the outside.

We're going to give him that chance. He's going outside. [cheers and applause]

Last time around — last time around, his campaign slogan was "Yes, we can." I'm afraid it's changing now to, no, he can't. (Laughter, cheers, applause.) And we're going to take back the White House —

AUDIENCE MEMBERS: No, he can't! No, he can't!

MR. ROMNEY: Washington is broken. Washington is broken. There's so much we need Washington to do. We have 23 million people out of work. Incomes have been declining for four years in a row. Eight percent unemployment for over — how many, 43 months, right here in Las Vegas and in Nevada. You've seen housing prices bumping along the bottom, record numbers of foreclosures. These are tough times, yet we have a president who says he can't fix Washington. I can. I will lead; I'll get the job done. (Sustained cheers, applause.)

Now, I'm asked — [cheers] — I am asked from time to time, what am I going to do? How am I going to get these things done. And there are five things I'd do — and I want to repeat them for you, if you haven't heard them before.

Number one. To get this economy going and create 12 million jobs in the next four years — and by the way, when we create those 12 million jobs, we're going to see incomes go up again. Because even people — as you know — [cheers] — even people with jobs are having a hard time right now because the median income in America has dropped by $4,300 a family. And when median income's about 50,000 bucks, you think about the impact on all those families that are seeing $4,300 in less take-home pay. And then, of course, the gasoline prices have doubled. The cost of health insurance has gone way up. The cost of food is up. Cost of electricity is up.

These are tough time even — times even for the people who have a job. So it's hard for that have a job, hard for those that don't have a job.

So you ask me, what am I going to do to get those jobs and rising wages? Number one, I'm going to take advantage of our oil, our coal, our gas — [cheers and applause] — our nuclear and our renewables. And that means — and that means, by the way — it means doing the opposite of what the president did. He has cut in half the licensing and permitting for oil and gas drilling on federal lands, and as you know, there are a lot of federal lands in the West of America. Governor, what's the percentage of — the percentage in Nevada that is federal lands is 87 percent. All right? So I'm — I'm going to make sure that we double — not cut in half, we double the number of licenses and permits to drill for oil and gas on federal lands. [cheers and applause]

I'm going to make sure — I'm going to make sure our air and our water are clean, but I'm not going to let the EPA use its regulations to stop the mining and use of coal. [cheers and applause]

And I am going to bring that pipeline in from Canada, so we can get their oil. [cheers and applause]

So that's number one — energy.

Number two is trade. I want to make sure that we have more trade, with Latin America in particular. And if someone cheats, like China has been cheating, we're going to stop it. We're going to crack down on cheaters that are stealing our jobs. [cheers and applause]

Number three — number three, we need to make sure that our workers have the skills they need to succeed. And right now Washington — Washington thinks it knows better than the — the people of Nevada how to train people.

There are 40 — I think it's 47 different job training programs. And they report to eight different federal agencies. All that money, all that overhead — what I want to do is take those dollars, bundle it up, send it back to Nevada and say, you train your people for the jobs the people in Nevada need and want. [cheers and applause]

And to have — and to have the skills to succeed, we not only have to train our current workers, but also we have to make sure our kids are getting the education that will allow them to succeed. [cheers and applause] And — and we know how to do that. This is not a mystery. We can look at various nations around the world and see who's successful and who's not. We can look at our nation and see on average that our kids are scoring in the bottom quartile or bottom third in math and sciences. It's unacceptable.

I'm very proud that in my state, my predecessors there, both in the — the governor's office and the legislators worked hard, made changes to improve our schools. They're now ranked number one in the nation. This I know. [cheers and applause] If you want to have — if you want to have great schools, you have to put the kids and their parents and the teachers first, and the teachers' union behind. [cheers and applause]

Number four, number four, in order to create jobs, entrepreneurs have to be convinced, and businesses of all kinds that do the hiring have to be convinced, that we're not on the road to Greece, where we're not going to be in a setting where — where we have fiscal calamity. And so we have to make very certain that we do something politicians have talked about but politicians on both sides of the aisle have not done. And that is, I will cut federal spending, I will cap it, and we'll finally get on track to a balanced budget. [cheers and applause]

And number five, number five, to get this economy going, we have to champion small business.

We have to make it easier for entrepreneurs — [cheers and applause] — and small businesses. And that means — that means doing the opposite of what the president's proposed.

He's going to raise taxes on a million small businesses. I want to lower the taxes on all of the small businesses. [cheers and applause] I want to get — I want to get regulators who see their job as not just stopping the bad guys but also encouraging the good guys. And I also want to take this big cloud off of small business. I want to repeal "Obamacare" and replace it with something that will get the costs under control. [cheers and applause]

Now, there are also some things we have to do to make housing work right here in Nevada. We have to reignite the housing economy here so that home values start going up again. It's just unacceptable. And there's some things I'll do. One, you all know the impact of having — having a vacant home on someone's block, all right, when having the garage door dented and perhaps graffiti or big weeds growing — that hurts the whole neighborhood. The federal government has about 200,000 foreclosed homes they're holding on it. I'll make sure we get them sold so every home is occupied and we fix our neighborhoods. [cheers and applause]

Now maybe — maybe some of you have tried to get a mortgage lately. And if you have, you'll find out how hard it is to get a mortgage lately. And I'll — I'll tell you why. It's kind of a confusing thing, but they passed this law called Dodd-Frank. And in there, they say — [booing] — in there they say that if you don't give out a qualified mortgage — it has to be a qualified mortgage or you could face very serious penalties. Now, the only problem is they didn't define what a qualified mortgage is.

So for two years, the people who were bankers and mortgage bankers want to give mortgages, but they don't know whether they're going to get in trouble because they don't know what the definition of a "qualified mortgage" is. And so we've had a hard time getting credit out to people who would want to buy a house. I will get credit flowing to people who are qualified so they can buy a home, and we can start moving more homes and raise values. [cheers and applause]

And you also — so you got to get credit to the home market if you're going to see home prices come up again. And the other thing you have to do is you have to have people who are able to buy a home — who have a job, who have an income. And that's why my plan to get 12 million new jobs in America and take-home pay is the ultimate way to get home values up. We're going to do it. Las Vegas is coming back. [cheers and applause]

And there's one more thing. There's one more thing that's going to help Las Vegas and get home values up and get unemployment down here. And that is, you're going to have a president that encourages people to come to Las Vegas for company meetings, not to stay home or go somewhere else. [cheers and applause]

You guys, this is important. What we're talking about is important. It's important to 23 million people that don't have a job. It's important to those folks that are coming out of college that wonder whether they can find a job. This last spring, half the kids out of — coming out of college couldn't find work, or college-level work. This is — this is the most prosperous nation in the history of the Earth. How can that be? We have got to fix this for ourselves, for the coming generation and for the world. It matters for America to be strong.

I was in Poland. I was in Poland a few in Poland a few — a few weeks ago, and got the chance to meet a world hero, Lech Walesa — [cheers and applause] — a — a man who stood up to the Soviet Union.

And I came in and he — he looked at me. He said, you — you must be tired. You sit. I talk. You listen. (Laughter, groans.)

And so I did. [laughter] And then he said one thing time and again over about 15 minutes. He said, where's America's leadership? We need America to lead. America's the only superpower on the planet. We need leadership.

We need leadership, American leadership, around the world. We need to have a military so strong, no one would ever think of testing America — [cheers and applause] —

AUDIENCE MEMBERS: USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA!

MR. ROMNEY: You see, I think the place only the president's comfortable cutting is our military. [boos] His — his White House proposed this sequestration idea that's taking hundreds of billions of dollars out of our military. His own budget takes out more hundreds of millions of dollars out of our military. I will not cut our military. The world is not safe. We must have a strong military — [cheers and applause] — and keep it so strong the world knows we're there.

We're coming back, you guys. The energy and passion of the American people is going to help reignite this economy and keep us strong and allow us to lead in a time when the world needs American leadership. I've been able to go during this campaign across the country and meet heroes. I see these — these men and women here that are wearing the — the uniform — [cheers and applause] — of our nation — a World War II veteran, a World War II veteran. [cheers and applause] Would you — would our veterans please raise their hand and be recognized?

Thank you. Vietnam veterans. Korean veterans. (Sustained applause.) I've seen the spirit, the patriotism of the men and women who serve, and we love and appreciate them.

I've — I've also seen the homes of America and how much we love our children and care for them and invest in their future. I've seen also the — the people who start businesses that employ themselves and one another. And — and I — I'm always amazed at the — the ways that people are can-do and how they start businesses and grow them.

And sometimes the — the innovativeness just — just inspires me. Why, Debbie Summers , right here in Las Vegas — you probably don't know Debbie — she's in the furniture rental business. You know her. She — furniture rental — she — [laughter] — she rents a — she rents furniture to conventions that come here and to nightclubs and so forth. I went to her warehouse. It — it looked to me like what she rents are black Naugahyde sofas and — and black coffee tables. And — and after President Obama said not to come here for company meetings, her business totally dived.

And — [booing] — and she was going to — she was going to lose her business, perhaps, and lose the jobs of people who worked there. But, you know, she's creative and innovative. And she said, you know what, instead of just renting furniture, I'm going to teach my employees how to make furniture. So she taught them how to make furniture. [cheers and applause] And now they sell furniture around the country, and they rent furniture here as well. That's the kind of spirit that you find in this country. It's amazing.

I met a Russian immigrant. And he — he came to — to San Diego. He had a back problem. And he — he was wondering how he was going to get that back — back problem solved. He talked to some doctors and so forth. They didn't have a great idea. He came up with a — an idea for how he could fuse a backbone in the best — in the best way and a new way to do the surgery.

And so he began a little company. Today that little company has $900 million in revenues, employs 1,300 people. It's called NuVasive. That's the nature of America, immigrants coming here, building our country. [cheers and applause]

And by the way, did you know that — did you know that the immigrant community, Latinos and other immigrants come here — they build new businesses more often than those that have been — those of us been all — been here all of our lives. We welcome people who come here and build enterprises and put Americans to work. And we want to help them. [cheers and applause] And he said it — he said it right there. He said, you know what, if you come here and you build a business, you did build that business. [cheers and applause] The government did not build that business. [cheers and applause]

This is — this is a time of choice for the country. This is a time when we could decide to go down the path President Obama's put us on. He's said he wants to poll our resources and re-allocate, all right. He's going to — he's going to — [booing] — take from some and give to others. This redistribution idea — this redistribution idea has been tried in other places. This is not a new idea. It's just never worked in other places and it's certainly not going to work here.

He wants a bigger and bigger government, trillion dollar deficits. What that leads to is not more people coming out of poverty; it's putting more people into poverty. [cheers and applause] Look, government is there and must be there for people who need help — for disabled, for the elderly that need help, for those that can't care for themselves. Of course, we will always be there. We're a compassionate people. But as someone has said, we don't measure compassion by how many people are on food stamps. We measure compassion by how many people can get off of food stamps and get a good job. [cheers and applause]

I'm convinced — I'm convinced that the path he's put us on is the path to Europe or, I jokingly say, to California, all right? [laughter] And I don't want to go there. That's not working there. I don't want to have it come here.

I don't want to have a government getting bigger and bigger, more intrusive, telling us what kind of health insurance we have to have. I don't want to have a government that becomes so large that it smothers the American dream. I don't want to have a government that takes from some and gives to others. What I want to do is restore the principles of freedom that made America's economy work in the first place. [cheers and applause]

I believe in the vision of the founders. I believe that when they said God gave us our rights, they were right. And among those rights are life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness. [cheers and applause] We are not going to transform America into something we would not recognize. We will restore American greatness by restoring the principles of — of America. We will restore freedom, free opportunity for the American people to realize their dreams. That's what's going to bring us back.

I want to create those 12 million jobs. I want to help every citizen of this country have a bright and prosperous future. I want your children to know the future will be better than the past. We're going to make it happen. I need you to get me elected in November. Let's get the job done. Let's get America strong again. [cheers and applause]

Thank you so very much, Nevada. [cheers and applause] Thank you, Las Vegas. Thank you. [cheers and applause]