President Barack Obama waves after arriving on Air Force One at Moffett Federal Airfield in Moffett Field, Calif., Thursday, June 6, 2013. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

(CNSNews.com) - President Barack Obama says Democrats "don't want to tax all businesses out of business."

"I know that there are a few Republicans here in the audience," Obama said Friday at a fundraiser for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign in Palo Alto, Ca. "If you talk to us, it turns out we're pretty common-sense folks.













If the player does not load, please check that you are running the latest version of Adobe Flash Player. "We don't want to tax all businesses out of business," Obama said. "But we do think that there's a role to play for government."





The president's remarks came at a private residence during a fundraising tour last week for the 2014 midterm elections.





Obama has made similar statements in the past. When speaking about implementing a cap and trade system when running for president in 2008, Obama said he would bankrupt coal power plants



The coal industry "would have to meet the rigors of that market and the ratcheted-down caps that are being placed, imposed every year," he said.

"So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can; it's just that it will bankrupt them because they're going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that's being emitted," Obama said.

During the 2012 election campaign, Obama also drew criticism for a speech where he said, "If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen."





"We don't think government can do everything," he said. "We don't think that top-down solutions are the right way to go. We believe in the free market. We believe in a light touch when it comes to regulations."