Tommy Thompson endorsed by U.S. Chamber of Commerce

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The U.S. Chamber of Commerce endorsed Thompson Tuesday over his Democratic opponent Tammy Baldwin. Chamber senior vice president Rob Engstrom and Missouri Sen. Roy Blunt appeared with Thompson at a factory in Milwaukee.

Engstrom and Blunt said Thompson, a Republican, had a great pro-business record as Wisconsin’s governor and he’ll build on it if he’s elected to the U.S. Senate.

The U.S. Chamber has already spent $1.6 million on TV ads attacking Baldwin.

Engstrom said Baldwin has supported business only 13 percent of the time in her House votes in 2010 and 2011.

Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce president Kurt Bauer criticized Baldwin’s support of the Affordable Care Act and her opposition to the Keystone Pipeline which would bring Canadian crude oil to the U.S. Thompson said he would boost the economy by pushing for a balanced federal budget and reducing the deficits.

He also wants to end a 35-percent tax on off-shore investments, saying it would generate $1 trillion in new business capital.

Baldwin’s campaign issued a statement claiming that Thompson’s ideas would send more U.S. jobs overseas.

The campaign issued a press release Wednesday saying Thompson, when he was secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, called himself the mastermind of “a sweetheart deal with the drug companies that made it illegal for the Medicare program to negotiate lower drug prices for Wisconsin seniors.”

The Baldwin campaign said the Bush administration measure wasn’t paid for and increased the deficit by billions of dollars.

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