$4 Trillion Deficit Savings? Nope
CLINTON: "[Obama] has offered a reasonable plan of $4 trillion in debt reduction over a decade....It passes the arithmetic test."
Not accurate, says WaPo's Glenn Kessler. The claim relies on the "budget gimmick" of counting Iraq war spending projected into the future, money that the administration "never intended to spend." Kessler subtracts $2,648 from the $4 trillion, leaving Obama's plan at just under $1.4 trillion in savings.
4.5 million new jobs? Debatable.
CLINTON: "So here's another job score. President Obama: plus 4.5 million. Congressional Republicans: zero."
The 4.5 million is BS, says Kessler. It's "a cherry-picked number" because it only includes private-sector jobs.
Bloomberg's factcheck, however, rates this claim entirely true. "Clinton said that in the last 29 months the economy has produced about 4.5 million private-sector jobs...The statement is true."
Do Dem presidents create more jobs? The consensus is yes.
CLINTON: "What's the jobs score? Republicans 24 million, Democrats 42 million!"
"Clinton's math is correct," says Bloomberg. Right-leaning Factcheck.org agrees on this one, and so does Politifact.
Will Medicare go broke under Romney? Not exactly.
CLINTON: "So if [Romney is] elected, and if he does what he promised to do, Medicare will now go broke in 2016."
The Medicare Trust Fund would be exhausted by 2016 without Obamacare, but that doesn't mean Medicare will be "broke," notes Sarah Kliff at WaPo. Nearly every year since 1972 there's been a prediction that the trust fund will become insolvent, but it never happens because Congress can "chip in with extra dollars."
You can see how Clinton's other claims stand up to scrutiny at Factcheck.org, Glenn Kessler and Sarah Kliff at WaPo, Politifact, AP, Politico, and Bloomberg.
