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SALT LAKE CITY — A man working at the Florida fundraising event where presidential candidate Mitt Romney made the infamous '47 percent' comment is claiming he made the video that some say swung the race.
Scott Prouty, 38, a bartender for the catering company hired that evening, had brought his camera to the May 17 Boca Raton, Fla. event hoping for a picture with Romney. He had worked at a previous event where Bill Clinton had posed with the kitchen and staff.
"We were never told that this was a secret meeting or a private meeting or don't bring cameras," Prouty said. "There were plenty of people in the room with cameras."
In an interview with MSNBC, Prouty said he was behind the incriminating video that many political observers believe swung the election.
"I had no idea it was going to be this big thing it turned out to be," Prouty said.
With only seven weeks left in the presidential campaign, the liberal magazine Mother Jones published a leaked video of a private fundraiser.
I felt an obligation for all the people who can't afford to be there. You shouldn't have to be able to afford $50,000 to hear what the candidate actually thinks.
–Scott Prouty
According to the Huffington Post, Prouty wanted the remarks to be the focus of the release, not his identity. He worked to release it without identifying him as the filmmaker.
"I felt an obligation for all the people who can't afford to be there. You shouldn't have to be able to afford $50,000 to hear what the candidate actually thinks," Prouty said.
Once Prouty decided the video should be published and he had an "obligation" to do so, he posted it to YouTube, contacted Romney's campaign, Daily Kos, Pastebin, commented on Washington Post and Huffington Post, and finally, Mother Jones.
Romney has said the quote was taken out of context and not "elegantly stated."
"When you're speaking in private, you don't spend as much time thinking about how something could be twisted and distorted and — and it could come out wrong and be used," Romney said in a March 3 interview with Chris Wallace. "But, you know, I did. And it was very harmful. What I said is not what I believe."
MSNBC reached out to the Romneys Wednesday, but were directed to the interview with Wallace.
