US News

Romney aides point out Obama ate dog meat as a child

WASHINGTON — In the latest tit-for-tat in Mitt Romney’s lingering dog problem, aides to the Republican candidate are gleefully pointing out that President Barack Obama ate dog meat as a child.

The tale of Romney’s Irish setter Seamus — who traveled in a crate atop the family’s station wagon on a 1983 trip from Boston to Canada — has dogged the former Massachusetts governor for years.

Romney and his wife were most recently asked about the incident during an interview Monday with ABC’s Diane Sawyer and Ann Romney’s defense that Seamus “loved” traveling on top of the family car drew snickers from some Democrats and dog lovers.

Biting back Tuesday, conservative news site The Daily Caller made note of a passage in Obama’s book “Dreams from My Father,” in which the president recounted some of his adventurous eats while living in Indonesia with his stepfather Lolo Soetoro from age six to 10.

“With Lolo, I learned how to eat small green chili peppers raw with dinner (plenty of rice), and, away from the dinner table, I was introduced to dog meat (tough), snake meat (tougher), and roasted grasshopper (crunchy),” part of the passage reads.

Daily Caller blogger Jim Treacher commented, “Say what you want about Romney, but at least he only put a dog on the roof of his car, not the roof of his mouth.”

Romney’s campaign quickly seized on the anecdote. On Tuesday night, top Romney aide Eric Fehrnstrom re-posted a tweet originally made in January by Obama adviser David Axelrod that showed a picture of the president riding inside a car with his pet Bo, a Portuguese water dog.

In a jab at Romney, Axelrod’s original caption read, “How loving owners transport their dogs.” But Fehrnstrom commented, “In hindsight, a chilling photo.”

Romney spokesman Ryan Williams also linked to an ABC report on the story on Twitter, saying, “Not the headline Team Obama was looking for.”

Obama campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt fired back, tweeting, “What’s the next attack [Fehrnstrom] and the RNC will surface on a 6-10 year old?”

Asked about the back and forth during an interview with Ohio radio station WLW Wednesday, Romney said, “This campaign is going to ultimately become about jobs not dogs.”