Green Jobs
The Claim: Romney, criticizing Obama’s focus on alternative energy, told the president that “$90 billion, and these businesses, many of them have gone out of business, I think about half of them of the ones that have been invested in, have gone out of business, a number of them happen to be owned by people who were contributors to your campaigns.”
The Background: Romney is referring to the amount of money for clean energy in the 2009 economic stimulus, including a program that gave a $535 million loan guarantee to Solyndra LLC, the solar panel maker that later went bankrupt.
The Facts: While Romney is right the stimulus provided $90 billion for clean-energy programs, he wrongly gives the impression all of it went directly to companies like Solyndra. In fact, the stimulus also retrofitted low-income homes to lower their energy costs, provided tax breaks to wind and solar producers, and funded research to reduce coal pollution. Of the $90 billion, $16 billion was spent on the loan-guarantee program that financed Solyndra. Three of the 28 companies that received guarantees later filed for bankruptcy, a slower rate of failure than anticipated by Congress, according to an analysis released in February. Investors in the companies that benefited include both Democratic and Republican donors.
