Mitt Romney at the 35th annual Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, DC, Thursday, February 7, 2008. (Chuck Kennedy/MCT)
by Mark Silva
Republican Mitt Romney abandoned his campaign for president today before a crowd that apparently stood ready to support the former governor of Massachusetts as the “true conservative” in the 2008 race — effectively clearing a path for Sen. John McCain of Arizona to become the Republican Party’s presidential nominee.
“If I fight on in my campaign, all the way to the convention… I forestall the launch of a national campaign, and frankly I would be making it easier for Sen. Clinton or Obama to win,” Romney said to calls of “no… no… no” in the packed hall of the Conservative Action Political Convention in Washington. “Frankly, in this time of war, I simply cannot let my campaign be a part of aiding a surrender to terror.
“This isn’t an easy decision. I hate to lose,” Romney told the crowd. “If this were only about me, I’d go on, But it’s never been only about me. I entered this race because I love America, and because I love America, in this time of war, I now feel I have to stand aside.”
Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts who has spent more than $35 million of his own fortune on his campaign for president, stepped on to the stage of a crowded Conservative Political Action Conference at a Washington hotel ballroom today as news was spreading that he is “suspending” his bid for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination.McCain, the GOP presidential front-runner still fighting for respect among the most conservative core of his party’s members, will address the conference this afternoon.
Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas and an ordained Baptist minister, will address the conference on Saturday. Huckabee, who has carried the party primaries of several Southern states including his own as well as Iowa’s GOP caucuses, has insisted that he will remain in the race to the end – declaring as polls closed on Super Tuesday that people have called the GOP’s contest a two-man race and they’re right – “and we’re in it.”
But now that Romney is out of it, Republicans will face increasing pressure to choose between a candidate with momentum and a message that he is best-suited to give the Democrats a run for their money in November – McCain – and a candidate who aligns most closely with the party’s social conservatives, Huckabee.
“I don’t think anyone expects in this room that another Ronald Reagan is going to walk through this door,” radio talk show host Laura Ingraham told the crowd here. “But we do want a candidate who is proud to be a conservative and who embodies those conservative ideals – is that too much to ask?”
“I think the question,”’ she said to cheers, “is what have you been doing for conservatism lately?”
“Mitt Romney is the conservative’s conservative,” she said, suggesting that of all the people who got to introduce candidates at this forum she wass the one introducing the conservative.
(She also opened with a joke about the $5 million that Sen. Hillary Clinton has loaned her own campaign. No surprise, she said – “That tear duct-enlargement surgery is really expensive.”
With Super Tuesday’s balloting, McCain has staked a solid claim as his party’s front-runner, having won 703 delegates for his party’s presidential nominating convention – more than 60 percent of the total needed. Romney has claimed 293, Huckabee 190.
Yet within the GOP, the most conservative ranks complain that McCain is not conservative enough for them.
With conservative commentators protesting McCain’s anointment – Rush Limbaugh on the radio; Ann Coulter warning that she will campaign for Hillary Clinton if McCain is the GOP nominee – McCain’s allies are attempting to convince the party’s core conservatives that McCain’s blood runs red while reminding moderates that McCain is the truly electable Republican.
“We’re going to have a tough road ahead of us – we’re going to have a headwind against us in November,” says Frank Donatelli, who served as political director in the final two years of the Reagan White House and is backing McCain, in an interview with the Tribune. “We, by far, are the most electable Republican.
“It is true that among self-identified conservative voters, we have a minority share of that, but we do have a share.” Donatelli says. “But among the rest of the party, moderates and the rest, we have the broadest base of support. The fact is that we’re the candidate best positioned to put the whole coalition together.”
It’s only natural, this self-styled “Reaganaut” suggests, that Republicans watching their favorites fade after the early primaries will take time to grow comfortable with the party’s nominee.
“The key point is that all the candidates, by some, were found lacking in one way or another,” he says. “But the fact is that we have three candidates left, and we have one that has 700 delegates. So conservatives are looking at us, and our goal today is to begin to introduce John to people who maybe haven’t heard his views.”
(Make that two candidates now – plus Ron Paul.)
“Once we past this conference, I think he will be well received,” Donatelli says of McCain, “and once we continue to win primaries, I feel pretty confident things will calm down.”
Romney bowed out in a dramatically public fashion today.
“I look forward to joining you many, many more times in the future,” said Romney, who said CPAC had given him “the sendoff I needed” at last year’s convention. He was single-digits in the polls, he said, and drew strength from their straw-poll support.
“For all of you here, thank you, for caring about America,” Romney said to cheers in the packed ballroom. “As I said to you last year, conservative principals are needed now more than ever.”
Romney, as he often does at a big speech, was working from a Tele-PrompTer, enabling him to keep his eyes on the hall.
Calling the “culture” of America the key to its success, Romney reeled out a clarion call to conservatives to protect their culture from attacks on religion and the family.
“The attack on faith and religion is no less relentless,” Romney said, suggesting that the tolerance of pornography has led to a “grim reality” in the United States. “A nation built on the principals of the founding fathers cannot long stand when its children are raised without fathers in the home.”
“Conservatives here and conservatives across the country will always be honored to stand on principle,” he said. “The attack on culture is not the only challenge we face…. The prosperity and security of our children and our grandchildren depend on us.”
Romney has maintained that he is not only a social and fiscal conservative, but also a foreign-policy conservative.
“America must never be held hostage by the likes of Putin, Chavez and Ahmadinejad,” Romney said, aligning his own new axis of evil with the leaders of Russia, Venezuela and Iran.
“It is time to lower corporate taxes… to take a Weed Whacker… take it to regulations, reform entitlements and, by the way, stand up to the voracious appetites of the unions and our government,” he said. “Finally, let’s consider the greatest challenge facing (us)… the threat of violent radical Islamic Jihad.”
“Soon the face of liberalism in America will have a new name – whether it is Barack or Hillary,” Romney said of the two remaining Democratic Party presidential candidates. “I know that, even though we face an uphill fight, many in this room are fully behind my campaign,” and people cheered, “Mitt, Mitt, Mitt..
“You’re with me all the way to the convention. Fight on,” Romney said. “But there is an important difference…. Today, we are a nation at war, and Barack and Hillary have made their intentions clear on Iraq and the war in Iraq. They would retreat.
“I disagree with Sen. McCain on a number of issues, as you know, but I agree with him on doing whatever it takes to be successful in Iraq,” Romney said. “I agree with him on eliminating al Qaeda and terrorism worldwide.”
mdsilva@tribune.com
