Hours after he secured the endorsement of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Mitt Romney credited his brother, President George W. Bush, with keeping the country from a great depression in 2008.

"I keep hearing the president say he's responsible for keeping the country out of a Great Depression," Romney said at a town hall in Arbutus, Maryland. "No, no, no, that was President George W. Bush and [then-Treasury Secretary] Hank Paulson."

With the economy turning around, Romney appears intent on denying President Barack Obama ownership of the recovery, as he's previously argued that any reduction in unemployment has occurred despite Obama's policies.

Romney's statement comes in the midst of a tough day for his campaign, following a self-inflicted wound by strategist Eric Fehrnstrom, who compared his candidate's shift to the general election to shaking an Etch-A-Sketch.