Lobbyist Steve Marino, a Republican state House candidate, has become the gift that keeps on giving for Michigan Democrats.
As expected, the Michigan Democratic Party has released more recordings of Marino making remarks that are highly damaging to his campaign. The pattern continues.
In audio tapes released by the Dems last week, the registered lobbyist bragged about paying off big bar tabs for lawmakers and engaging in a ploy to avoid paying property taxes on his Harrison Township home. The tapes released today, again secretly recorded by a Dem campaign tracker at a 2015 Marino “coffee hour” event, demonstrate Marino’s fondness for outsourcing jobs.
That includes paying poverty wages and engaging in child labor.
When the tracker, posing as a constituent, complains about outsourcing, the 27-year-old Marino claims that he has a company in China that benefits from cheap wages.
“Why am I going to pay an individual $80,000 a year, when I can pay somebody $5,000 a year in a different country and do it however I want to do it,” he said.
He added that, if he was the Ford Motor Co. CEO, he could manufacture cars in India and gain huge benefits by avoiding U.S. standards.
“What if Ford, you know, says, those standards are too high. ‘We’ve crunched the numbers and in the long run it’s easier for us just to move our plant to India. What if we build over there where materials are 1/100th of the cost, and we can have people 10 and 12 years old working?’” he said.
The Democrats also point out that Marino, as a Macomb County commissioner, voted against a resolution last year that opposed the controversial free trade pact with Asian countries, the pending Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
Marino is running for an open seat, currently held by term-limited Republican Rep. Tony Forlini, against Dana Camphous Peterson in November. Camphous Peterson, a Harrison Township Democrat, is a former county commissioner. The campaign for one of the most coveted House seats in Michigan, is being waged in the 24th District, which includes Harrison Township and portions of northern Clinton Township and southern Macomb Township.
I thought you had to actually hit puberty to hold office in Michigan.
How sad that Donald Trump did not discover this brilliant young business man for his running mate! Openly discussing child labor is long overdue!