CONCORD — The presidential campaign war heated up Thursday as supporters of both candidates leveled familiar charges in dueling press conferences.

Democrats charged Republican Mitt Romney with hiding his real wealth in Bermuda to avoid paying his fair share of taxes, investing in foreign tax havens, and they called him a pioneer in outsourcing American jobs to foreign countries.

State Democratic Party Chair Ray Buckley and 2008 Obama New Hampshire Campaign Co-Chair Ned Helms called on Romney to release 12 years of his tax returns as his father did when he ran for president in 1968.

Republicans charged that President Barack Obama failed to make good on his promises to cut the national debt and deficit and said his lack of leadership on the issue has added $5 trillion to the national debt.

“The only issue that should be debated this fall is how to deal with the debt and deficit,” said Republican National Committeeman and Concord businessman Steve Duprey.

Duprey said Republicans do not come to the debt and deficit issue “with clean hands,” and he agreed that “economists have said the deficit, and therefore the debt, would explode given some of the programs Governor Romney has put forward.”

Duprey said those projections do not take into account entitlement reform that Romney proposed which would reduce the deficit.

Duprey was critical of the Bush tax cuts, saying they were not paid for and neither was the prescription drug benefit for the Medicare Program.

“If you don’t pay for them, it will not work for anybody,” Duprey said. “We are going to have to make cuts for everyone.” If not, he added, “You rob the future of our children.”

Both Hudson business owner Jack Gilchrist of Gilchrist Metal Fabricating, and state Rep. Marilinda Garcia of Salem said the debt and deficits have created uncertainty that has resulted in extremely slow economic and job growth.

Gilchrist said the lack of an energy policy prevents him from being able to judge what those costs will be next year and makes him hesitant to add workers.

“I’m sitting on more cash than ever before, I might as well be a bank, but I don’t trust the banks,” Gilchrist said.

Garcia noted Obama as a candidate criticized George W. Bush for increasing the federal deficit as much as all other presidents combined, but the current president in three-and-a-half years had increased it even more than Bush.

She said the president has not taken responsibility and instead blames the prior administration.

“That’s a failure of not only leadership,” she said, “but of judgment.”

Democrats however, claimed Romney has set a new standard for not revealing his true financial resources.

Buckley alluded to an Associated Press story about Romney’s Bermuda-based company that Buckley said was created to avoid paying U.S. taxes.

“What he is doing is avoiding paying his fair share of taxes,” Buckley said.

He said Romney shares the same philosophy as former President George W. Bush, which benefits the few people, devastated the economy and destroyed the middle class.

“The tax code now is tilted toward the upper end and he wants to tip it more that way,” said Helms. “You cannot only talk about fairness, there has to be equity.”

grayno@unionleader.com