Rating Romney’s claim on Finnish auto stimulus

In the presidential battle over who sent more jobs overseas, Mitt Romney and his supporters are fond of citing the example of Fisker Automotive, the maker of a high-end plug-in electric sedan.

In an ad he is airing in Ohio called “Where did all the money go,” the Romney campaign suggests President Obama has a lot of explaining to do.

“Where did all the Obama stimulus money go?
Friends, donors, campaign supporters, special interest groups.
Where did the Obama stimulus money go?
Solyndra. $500 million taxpayer dollars. Bankrupt.
So where did the Obama stimulus money go?
Windmills from China. Electric cars from Finland.”

The day after that ad launched, Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus expanded on the attack in Philadelphia.

“President Obama took half a billion dollars of your taxpayer money and gave it to Fisker Automotive because they promised to create jobs at their Wilmington plant…. ” Priebus said. “But they didn’t create jobs for you. Their factory in Delaware… was supposed to be open today, but instead it’s closed. And Fisker is still building their cars in Finland.”

We checked out the claim that stimulus money went to buy electric cars from Finland as a payback to Obama supporters. But when PolitiFact sorted out the facts, it found the picture was very different. We rated that claim False.