Free Republic

Days before he officially becomes a U.S. senator, Mitt Romney took to the Washington Post to fire a shot across President Trump’s bow, saying Mr. Trump had made a “deep descent” in December and is hurting the national character. In an op-ed column published online Tuesday evening, Mr. Romney, now a Republican senator-elect for Utah, came down hardest on recent moves in foreign policy and Cabinet positions related to that. “After he became the nominee, I hoped his campaign would refrain from resentment and name-calling. It did not. When he won the election, I hoped he would rise to the...

In Arizona v. United States, the Supreme Court unanimously agreed that the federal government has no basis to nullify the "show me your papers" provision of Arizona's immigration law. Conservatives Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, moderate Anthony Kennedy, liberals Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg -- even Obama appointee Sonia Sotomayor -- all shot down the administration's effort to stop that part of the law. (Obama appointee Elena Kagan stayed out of it because she had taken part in the action as a member of the administration.) Yet even with that unanimity -- a position supported, if the polls are...

Election '12: In his most brazen act of pandering to date, President Obama has dangled de facto amnesty to 800,000 illegal immigrants in a shameless bid to win Latino votes. This is pure banana-republic electoral politics. There's zero doubt Obama's Friday order to hand work permits to hundreds of thousands of illegals who claim they were brought here as children is merely an embattled and unpopular president's bid to gain an electoral edge. Politics trump all other factors that a responsible president would consider, such as the wisdom of dumping nearly a million new job seekers onto the market to...

Okay, maybe that wasn’t the best metaphor, but he fumbled an important opportunity. The problem with the president’s amnesty decree is not that it “makes it more difficult to reach that long-term solution because an executive order is, of course, just a short-term matter — it can be reversed by subsequent presidents.” The problem is that it’s u-n-c-o-n-s-t-i-t-u-t-i-o-n-a-l. You would expect Allen West and Steve King to be forceful in denouncing this usurpation, but even Amnesty John McCain and Rick “you don’t have a heart” Perry were strong. Heck, Lindsey Graham — Lindsey Graham — denounced the move as “possibly...

GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney’s camp is defending a controversial program he created that handed out free wheels to Massachusetts welfare recipients — including state-funded insurance and AAA memberships — even as the plan drew fire from conservatives the former Bay State governor is wooing. “Over 80 percent of participants have moved off of welfare,” said Romney spokeswoman Gail Gitcho.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has been unofficially running for president for the better part of five years, and in that time, he has been asked about immigration over and over again. Now some of his rivals are arguing that his answers to the question have been inconsistent. And the issue blew up last week at a CNN debate on national security. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said someone who has lived peacefully in the United States for many years with a family, a community and a job should have an opportunity to become a legal permanent resident. Mitt Romney...

A gaping loophole in state insurance rules that lets freeloaders pick up coverage to pay for expensive surgeries — and then dump it once they’re treated — has cost taxpayers as much as $37 million a year, according to a study that warns the same wrinkle in Obamacare could add a staggering $2 billion a year to the deficit-wracked federal budget[Emphasis mine]. Exploiting a state provision that forces insurers to cover patients with pre-existing medical conditions, thousands of so-called “jumpers and dumpers” are buying plans just before major operations and procedures, and then chucking their coverage and passing those costs...

After tonght's debate, Mitt Romney's campaign clearly saw an opening to go after a surging Newt Gingrich, after he argued for considering a path to citizenship for immigrants who had originally come to this country illegally 25 years ago, but had spent decades integrating themselves in a community. “Newt Gingrich supported the 1986 amnesty act, and even though he conceded that was a mistake, he said that he was willing to repeat that mistake, by extending amnesty to immigrants who are illegally in the country today," Romney adviser and spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom said in the spin room following the AEI/Heritage...

Romney’s 2004 rules allowed benefits for illegal immigrants The Los Angeles Times is reporting Mitt Romney’s signature achievement while Governor of Massachusetts – Romneycare – includes provisions that allow illegal immigrants to receive full health benefits for free. According to the L.A. Times, then-Gov. Romney and his administration knew about provisions in the Romneycare that would allow illegal immigrants to receive free health care. The Times reported: “…there was broad understanding when Romney signed it that at least some people who would benefit would be in the country illegally.” [1] “Governor Romney’s government-mandated health care plan provided free care for...

On the Republican campaign trail, he derides any such public aid. But the healthcare law he signed as Massachusetts governor allows it. Reporting from Washington— The Massachusetts healthcare law that then-Gov. Mitt Romney signed in 2006 includes a program known as the Health Safety Net, which allows undocumented immigrants to get needed medical care along with others who lack insurance. Uninsured, poor immigrants can walk into a health clinic or hospital in the state and get publicly subsidized care at virtually no cost to them, regardless of their immigration status.

Winning in politics isn’t everything, it’s the only thing. But how important a factor electability should be in a voter’s calculation remains very much in the eye of the beholder, leading to an active debate within the parties about who has the best chance to win next November — and how much it should matter. That fight is played out every four years as the two parties pick their presidential nominees. The party establishment — and many members of the media — tend to focus heavily on electability while the party’s activist base prizes ideological alignment. “Electability usually doesn’t matter...

Will Romney’s Lawn Workers Sink His Candidacy? Alec MacGillisOctober 19, 2011Well, this much is clear: Rick Perry's campaign takes its cues from this blog, which just a few days ago asked in a headline, "Time for Perry to Bring up Mitt's lawn care?" Apparently, it was time. The question that came to my mind as that remarkable fracas last night was occurring was: could this turn into Mitt Romney's driver's license moment? Hillary Clinton was sailing along on an aura of inevitability in the fall of 2007, acing the debates much as Romney has done, when she found herself ganged up in a Philadelphia debate over her ambiguous...

DERRY, N.H. — Mitt Romney says he can appeal to Tea Partiers, even though activists and groups aligned with the movement are stressing that they need to defeat him in 2012. “I think I line up pretty well with the Tea Party,” he said in response to a question from The Daily Caller after touring the Derry Feed and Supply store. “They want to see smaller government. So do I.” But not everyone associated with the movement see Romney as one of them. Joe Miller, a former U.S. Senate candidate in Alaska and a Tea Party darling, is now running...

RUSH: Right. So the media was listening intently as I played the sound bite this week, Monday or Tuesday, and said, "Bye bye, nomination." Remember that? I said, "Bye bye, nomination." Well, the media has glommed on to that. They are thrilled. Listen. BASHIR: If Romney stands by his view that the world is getting warmer and that man is an important contributor, then how will he fare when so many Republicans believe that global warming is, in the words of Rush Limbaugh, a "complete hoax"? UYGUR: You've got 99.9% of the scientists in the world in one camp and...

Washington (CNN) - Mitt Romney has a message to Tea Party candidates nationwide: If you lose your Republican primary bids, stay on the sidelines. The former Massachusetts governor on Monday warned the grassroots movement not to mount third party efforts in general elections, which he said would siphon votes from Republican nominees. "If there is a conservative candidate that runs in the general election, then obviously, divide and fail is the result," Romney said in an interview with the conservative Web site Newsmax. "Hopefully Tea Party candidates will run in respective primaries and they will either win or lose. And...

Mitt Romney rejected Mike Huckabee's call for him to admit that the "RomneyCare" health care program failed, instead saying he's "proud" of "getting everyone covered" when he was governor of Massachusetts. "Mitt Romney is proud of what he accomplished for Massachusetts in getting everyone covered,” Romney’s spokesman, Eric Fehrnstrom, told the Boston Globe, in the first direct response Team Mitt made to Huckabee's criticism of the health plan in his new book. Fehrnstrom also put daylight between the Romney health care bill and President Obama's reform package, which is unpopular among voters and is the subject of several lawsuits by...

Q: When it comes to a government overhaul of health care, what is the difference between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney? A: Obama was against an individual insurance mandate before he was for it. Romney was for the mandate before he was against it. Actually, that's not precisely accurate. The real difference is that Obama acknowledges reversing his position, while Romney seems to be trying to have it both ways.

A tantalizing bit of 2012 gossip dropped way, way down in an otherwise fun piece about amnesty shills boo-hooing over having (temporarily) lost McCain. Note to Politico: This is what’s called “burying the lede.” Their hope now is that Republican presidential candidates and former operatives under Bush, a reform proponent, can convince GOP congressional leaders that the issue needs to be dealt with before 2012 — or that they could risk alienating the burgeoning Hispanic vote in the crucial swing states of New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, Arizona and Florida.Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a front-runner for the nomination, has signaled...

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a front-runner for the nomination, has signaled quietly to Graham that Republicans must address immigration before the campaign heats up, according to several sources familiar with the conversation.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, who recently campaigned with GOP former Gov. Pete Wilson as being "tough as nails" on illegal immigration, could alienate her crucial conservative base, some party members say, by declaring she's in lockstep on the issue with her rival: former Gov. Jerry Brown. In an opinion piece published this week in a Spanish-language publication in Southern California, Whitman wrote that there is "very little" that she disagrees with Brown on concerning the hot-button issue of illegal immigration. While both agree that undocumented immigrants should not be allowed to get amnesty or obtain driver's licenses, Brown's camp...