Trump and Romney exchange tirades
Clash between front-runner, former candidate shows widening Republican rift
WASHINGTON — Attacked by the previous Republican nominee for president as a vulgar, sexually debased bully unfit for the presidency, Donald Trump responded hours later with a furious string of insults.
The billionaire front-runner called Mitt Romney a “failed candidate” who “let us down” after running a “horrible campaign,” and also recalled meeting with Romney during the U.S. presidential campaign four years ago. He said Romney begged for his backing.
“I could’ve said, ‘Mitt, drop to your knees,’ he would have dropped to his knees,” Trump said at a rally in Maine on Thursday, adding, “If somebody hits me, I’m going to hit them back harder.”
Indeed, Romney’s extraordinary broadside was a hard hit, too.
“Let me put it plainly, if we Republicans choose Donald Trump as our nominee, the prospects for a safe and prosperous future are greatly diminished,” Romney said Thursday in Salt Lake City. “Dishonesty is Donald Trump’s hallmark.”
Calling Trump a bully who is motivated by greed, Romney asked voters to imagine their children and grandchildren acting like the outspoken former TV reality show host.
Romney said Trump’s plan to let Russia lead the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant was “the most ridiculous and dangerous idea of the entire campaign season,” and urged voters to back any other candidate they believed had the best chance of beating the New York businessman.
“If Donald Trump’s plans were ever implemented, the country would sink into a prolonged recession,” Romney said.
Romney’s speech at the University of Utah comes as many in the party fear that Trump can essentially end the contest if he pulls out victories in Ohio and Florida, two large, battleground states that hold primaries on March 15.
Romney offered a litany of reasons Trump would be bad for the U.S.: Trump’s tariffs would touch off a trade war and kill export jobs; his tax plan would balloon the deficit and national debt; and his plans overall “would be very bad for American workers and for American families.
“After all, this is an individual who mocked a disabled reporter, who attributed a reporter’s questions to her menstrual cycle, who mocked a brilliant rival (over) her appearance, who bragged about his marital affairs, and who laces his public speeches with vulgarity,” Romney said.
“There is dark irony in his boasts of his sexual exploits during the Vietnam War while (Arizona Sen.) John McCain, whom he has mocked, was imprisoned and tortured.”
Nick Clayson, 21, was one of hundreds of people who lined up two hours early to hear Romney speak.
“One of the most disgusting things to me is (Trump’s) refusal to denounce the KKK,” said Clayson, a political science student at Utah State University and registered Republican. “That’s a huge issue for me. If it came down to Clinton or Trump I would want a third-party candidate to enter the race.”
Others in the queue flew in from out of town.
“For the first time in my life I might vote for a Democrat if it comes down to Trump,” said Rachel Walston, 37, a financial adviser from North Carolina and registered Republican.
As the party’s 2012 nominee, Romney is the most significant figure in an intensifying effort from the Republican establishment to take down Trump after his primary victories Tuesday, the single biggest day of voting in the Republican race.
Romney said he was not announcing his own candidacy and would not endorse any single candidate.
Instead, he named all three of Trump’s remaining rivals: Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, and Ohio Gov. John Kasich
The back-and-forth between Romney and Trump created the spectacle of the Republican party’s identity crisis playing out in full view. Trump can rightly say his unorthodox candidacy has brought new voters to the polls for the primaries, attracted to his tough talk and promise to “make America great again.”
Romney is viewed as a protector of a Republican establishment that many of Trump’s voters would say has lost touch with their day-to-day concerns. Romney’s own run against U.S. President Barack Obama in 2012 failed, in part, because Romney was painted as a wealthy elitist who benefited from Wall Street ways — the very thing voters in both parties are rebelling against this year.
Romney wasn’t alone Thursday in attacking Trump. Dozens of conservative national security experts warned that Trump was unfit to be commander in chief.
Former Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff and more than 70 others called Trump’s “embrace of the expansive use of torture” inexcusable. They also object to what they say is Trump’s “hateful, anti-Muslim rhetoric.”
Meanwhile, former Republican candidate Chris Christie, who has thrown his support behind Trump, defended his shellshocked expression as he stood behind the Republican frontrunner on Super Tuesday.
“No, I wasn’t being held hostage. No, I wasn’t sitting up there thinking, ‘Oh, my God, what have I done?’ ” Christie said Thursday in New Jersey. “I don’t know what I was supposed to be doing. All these armchair psychiatrists should give it a break.”
Despite Trump’s strong showing Tuesday, he was not yet on track to claim the nomination before the party’s national gathering. He has won 46 per cent of the delegates awarded so far, and he would have to increase that to 51 per cent in the remaining primaries.
Trump has 316 delegates so far, Texas Sen. Cruz 226 and Florida Sen. Rubio, 106. It takes 1,237 delegates to win the party nomination.
On the Democratic side, Clinton was drawing broad support from voters and her party’s leaders.
Rival Bernie Sanders vowed to keep up the fight, though his path to the nomination has narrowed. So far, Clinton has at least 1,005 delegates, Sanders 373. It takes 2,383 Democratic delegates to win.
“I could’ve said, ‘Mitt, drop to your knees ,’ he would have dropped to his knees.
DONALD TRUMP REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE