Obama Fundraises With "Ruthless" Outsourcer

“We will be ruthless,” Meredith famously said of Dell’s 2001 layoffs.

Obama in Austin today. Image by SAUL LOEB / Getty Images

After giving a speech in Austin, Texas in which he decried Mitt Romney for overseeing companies that outsourced jobs, President Obama attended a fundraiser hosted by Tom Meredith, a former Dell executive who once oversaw outsourcing at his own company — and said he would be “ruthless” about cutting costs.

In 2001, while serving as senior vice president of Dell Computer Corp, Meredith defended plans to lay off between 3,000 and 4,000 employees — largely in Texas — while sparing about 4,000 jobs in Asia Pacific. When that strategy was reported by the tech press at the time Meredith defended the move.

“We will be ruthless in how we address our cost structure,” Meredith said, a comment that drew wide attention at the time.

Obama has harshly criticized Romney for investing in companies that shipped jobs overseas, and said just Wednesday that he wants “to be a pioneer in in-sourcing.”

The fundraiser at Meredith’s Four Seasons penthouse cost couples as much as $25,000 to attend, according to the Boston Herald.