OPINION:
Sen. Mitt Romney, a Republican who carpetbagged from Massachusetts to Utah so as to run for retiring Orrin Hatch’s Senate seat, but denied doing so, and who slammed Donald Trump hard during his 2016 presidential run until Donald Trump won and then turned and begged for Donald Trump’s endorsement for his 2018 carpetbagging Senate run, but denied doing so, now says he’d rather vote for a Democrat than Donald Trump in 2024.
That’s called yep, par for the course. Romney has always seemed a snaky scumbag.
Like leopards with spots, snaky scumbags really don’t change. Not saying he is a snaky scumbag. Just saying he really, really, really seems like one.
“I’d be happy to support virtually any one of the Republicans — maybe not Vivek [Ramaswamy] — but the others that are running would be acceptable to me, and I’d be happy to vote for them,” Romney said in a recent CBS interview reported by The Hill.
“I’d be happy to vote for a number of the Democrats, too,” Romney added. “It would be an upgrade, in my opinion, from Donald Trump and perhaps also from Joe Biden.”
Of course Romney would be happy to vote for a Democrat. Of course Romney puts Trump at the bottom of the list, behind even the feckless, wandering and doddering Biden — “perhaps,” he says, “perhaps” another Democrat would be better than Biden. Only “perhaps.”
Romney is just doing what Romney does.
After running Massachusetts as a Republican governor — and bragging how his state-based Romneycare was the precursor to the federal socialized takeover of the free market health care system, called Obamacare — and then losing an impossible-to-lose election for president against the failing, flailing, under-duress Barack Obama in 2012, Romney packed his carpet bags and took off for Utah, singing praises about his Mormon faith while chanting disgust for what he called the “phony” and “fraud” Donald Trump. He ran for the retiring Hatch’s Senate seat, winning after the “phony” and “fraud” Trump endorsed him for his Senate seat.
And all Romney’s friends go — No! He’s really a good guy; not politically devious at all!
“After losing to Barack Obama in 2012,” Boston Magazine reported in June 2018, “campaign advisers say that Romney was done running for office. Within weeks of that election, one adviser said, he had picked out a spacious lot in Utah to build his retirement home. So, once again, his decision to run for the open Utah Senate seat was not a carpet-bagging relocation from New England, as pundits have suggested, but a local retiree waking up one day to find himself being recruited to fill Orrin Hatch’s shoes. Never mind how it looked when his Twitter profile changed from ‘Massachusetts’ to ‘Holladay, UT’ within hours of Hatch’s retirement announcement.”
Nothing to see here.
Just ol’ folksy Romney shuffling off to retirement when boom, bam, he happened to fall into a Senate seat. Oopsies. Kind of like that time when he forgot about his puppy on his rooftop and drove off, no doubt wondering about the source of all that irritating barking and whining. Stuff just happens.
“Mitt Romney accepts Trump’s endorsement in campaign for Senate,” ABC wrote in February of 2018.
The better headline is this, also in February of 2018, but from Vox: “Mitt Romney said he wouldn’t accept an endorsement from Trump. Monday night, he did.”
And when Trump wrote on social media this: “@MittRomney … will make a great senator and worthy successor to @OrrinHatch, and has my full support and endorsement!” — Romney tweeted in reply this: “Thank you Mr. President for the support. I hope that over the course of the campaign I also earn the support and endorsement of the people of Utah.”
And when Romney did win the support and endorsement of the people of Utah by winning his race for the Senate seat, Romney then turned around and told the world this, in 2020: “Mitt Romney says he did not vote for Trump in the 2020 election,” as CNN reported.
Of course he didn’t.
And of course he had to let everybody know he didn’t.
That’s what snaky scumbags do.
Now he’s stepping away from his congressional role, announcing he will not seek reelection for the Senate and pointing to his age, at 76, as the factor.
“Frankly,” Romney said, “it’s time for a new generation of leaders.”
Yes. It’s time for all the snaky scumbags to go.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley. Listen to her podcast “Bold and Blunt” by clicking HERE. And never miss her column; subscribe to her newsletter and podcast by clicking HERE. Her latest book, “Lockdown: The Socialist Plan To Take Away Your Freedom,” is available by clicking HERE or clicking HERE or CLICKING HERE.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.