Willard Mitt Romney (born March 12, 1947) is an American businessman, Republican Party politician, and was the 70th Governor of Massachusetts from 2003 to 2007. He is the son of the businessman and politician George W. Romney, and Lenore Romney.
Romney was raised in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan and served as a Mormon missionary in France. He attended Stanford University and Brigham Young University as an undergraduate, then earned a joint Juris Doctor/Master of Business Administration degree from the Harvard Law School and Harvard Business School. He entered the management consulting business which led to a position at Bain & Company, eventually serving as its CEO to lead it out of crisis. He was co-founder and head of Bain Capital, a private equity investment firm, which during his time there became highly profitable and one of the largest such firms in the nation. He ran as the Republican candidate in the 1994 U.S. Senate election in Massachusetts but lost to incumbent Edward M. Kennedy. Romney organized and steered the 2002 Winter Olympics as President and CEO of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee, and helped turn the troubled games into a financial success.
Romney won the election for Governor of Massachusetts in 2002. In his one term, he presided over a series of spending cuts and increases in fees while the state's finances improved. He signed into law the landmark Massachusetts health care reform legislation, which provided near-universal health insurance access via subsidies and mandates. Romney was a candidate for the Republican nomination in the 2008 United States presidential election, winning several caucuses and primaries but ultimately losing to John McCain. Since then he has published a book, No Apology: The Case for American Greatness, and also given speeches and raised campaign funds on behalf of fellow Republicans. He is widely seen as a front-runner for the Republican nomination in the 2012 presidential election
Romney was born in Detroit, Michigan.[1] He was the youngest child of George W. Romney, a man of humble upbringing who by 1948 had become an automobile executive, and Lenore Romney.[2] The three siblings before him were Margo Lynn, Jane LaFount, and G. Scott,[3] followed by Mitt after a gap of six years.[4] Romney was named after hotel magnate J. Willard Marriott, his father's best friend,[5] and the nickname of his father's cousin Milton Romney,[6] who played quarterback for the Chicago Bears from 1925 to 1929.[7] The youngster was called "Billy" until he reached kindergarten, when he indicated a preference for "Mitt".[8] Mitt formed a special bond with his father from his first year on.[9]
When Mitt was five, the family moved from Detroit to the affluent suburb of Bloomfield Hills.[2] His father became CEO of American Motors and turned the company around from the brink of bankruptcy with his promotion of the fuel-efficient, compact Rambler.[2][4] By the time Mitt was twelve, his father had become a nationally known figure in print and on television.[2][10] Mitt idolized him, read automotive trade magazines and kept abreast of automotive developments, and aspired to be an executive in the industry himself one day.[2][11][12] His father also presided over the Detroit Stake of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to which the family belonged.[13]
The Cranbrook School in Bloomfield Hills, which Mitt Romney attended from seventh grade on
Mitt went to public elementary schools,[8] and then from seventh grade on, attended Cranbrook School in Bloomfield Hills, an elite private boys preparatory school of the classic mold where he was the lone Mormon and where many students came from even more privileged backgrounds.[2][9][14][15] He was an indifferent athlete and at first an underachieving student.[2] While a sophomore, his father was elected Governor of Michigan. Mitt campaigned for him using loudspeakers at county fairs, exclaiming "You should vote for my father for Governor. He's a truly great person."[4] George Romney was a popular governor who was elected for three two-year terms; Mitt worked for him as an intern in the governor's office, and was present at the 1964 Republican National Convention when his moderate father battled conservative party nominee Barry Goldwater over issues of civil rights and ideological extremism.[2][11] Mitt did not flaunt the connection with his father to his friends nor did he trade in on his father's famous name to gain any advantages for himself.[8][11] Mitt had a steady set of chores growing up and worked summer jobs, including one as a security guard at a Chrysler plant.[9]
Romney enjoyed partying and was known as a kinetic kid who loved to pull off non-malicious pranks, such as sliding down golf courses on large ice cubes, dressing as a police officer and tapping on the car windows of teenage friends making out, and staging an elaborate formal dinner in the center of a busy intersection.[2][8][14][nb 1] Initially a manager for the hockey team and a cheerleader,[9] during his final year at Cranbook, he joined the cross country running team[8] and improved academically but was still not a star pupil.[2][14] His social skills were strong, however, and he won an award for those "whose contributions to school life are often not fully recognized through already existing channels."[14] In March of his senior year, he began dating Ann Davies, two years behind him, whom he had once known in elementary school;[16][17] she went to the private Kingswood School in Bloomfield Hills, the sister school to Cranbrook.[14] The two informally agreed to marriage after his senior prom in June 1965, which was shortly followed by his graduation.[2][17][18]
Romney attended Stanford University for a year.[2] Although the campus was becoming radicalized with the beginnings of 1960s social and political movements, Romney kept a clean-cut, Chamber of Commerce-style appearance, enjoying traditional campus events and in one case even protesting against a group of protesters staging a sit-in.[2]
Missionary work, later education, marriage and family
In 1966, Romney left for France for 30 months as a Mormon missionary,[2] a traditional duty that his father and other relatives had done before him.[19] He arrived in Le Havre with ideas about how to change the French Mission and better market their presence; he approached his duties with zeal, while facing physical and economic deprivation for the first time in his life in the mission's cramped quarters.[19][20] Rules against drinking, smoking, and dating were strictly enforced.[20] Like most Mormon missionaries, he failed to gain many converts, with the nominally Catholic but secular, wine-loving French people proving especially resistant.[2][19][20] He became demoralized, and later recalled it as the only time in his life when "most of what I was trying to do was rejected."[19] In one episode in Nantes, Romney suffered a badly bruised jaw in defending two female missionaries against a horde of local rugby players.[20] He continued to work hard, however, and encouraged his colleagues to read and absorb Napoleon Hill's recently republished self-help tome Think and Grow Rich.[20] Having grown up in Michigan rather than the more insular Utah world, Romney was better able to interact and relate to the local population.[15] After gaining a promotion to zone leader in Bordeaux in early 1968, he was still looking to rise higher; he subsequently became assistant to the mission president in Paris, the highest position a missionary could assume.[19][20] Romney's hawkish views about the Vietnam War were only reinforced when the French greeted him with hostility over his country's role in it and he debated them in return.[19][20] He also witnessed first-hand the May 1968 general strike and student uprisings.[19]
Old site of the France Paris Mission, where Romney served during his youth[21]
On June 16, 1968, Romney was involved in a serious automobile accident while driving fellow missionaries on dangerous roads in southern France.[2][15][22] As they drove through the village of Bernos-Beaulac, a Mercedes that was passing a truck missed a curve and suddenly swerved into the opposite lane and hit the Citroën DS Romney was driving in a head-on collision.[23] Trapped between the steering wheel and door, the unconscious and seriously injured Romney had to be pried from the car; a French police officer mistakenly wrote Il est mort in his passport.[2][12][22] The wife of the mission president was killed and other passengers were seriously injured as well.[22] George Romney relied on his friend Sargent Shriver, the U.S. Ambassador to France, to go to the local hospital and discover that Mitt had survived.[12] The fault for the accident was attributed completely to the driver of the other vehicle.[19][22] Romney had suffered broken ribs, a fractured arm, a concussion, and facial injuries, but recovered quickly without needing surgery.[15][22] Romney and another assistant became acting presidents of a mission demoralized and disorganized by the May disturbances and the accident.[15] Romney rallied and motivated the other missionaries and they met an ambitious goal of performing 200 baptisms for the year, the highest mark for the mission in a decade.[15] By the end of his mission in December 1968, Romney was overseeing the work of 175 fellow members.[19][22] Both the accident and the overall missionary experience changed Romney, giving him both an appreciation for the fragility of life and an ambition, capacity for organization and seriousness of purpose, and record of success that he had theretofore lacked.[2][15][20][22] It also presented a crucible for his religious faith, after having been only a half-hearted Mormon growing up: "On a mission, your faith in Jesus Christ either evaporates or it becomes much deeper. For me it became much deeper."[19]
While he was away, Ann Davies had converted to the LDS Church during 1966, guided by George Romney, and had begun attending Brigham Young University.[2][17] He was quite nervous that she had been wooed by others while he was away, and indeed she had dated others, but at their first meeting following his return they reconnected and agreed to get married as soon as possible.[17][24] Romney married Ann Davies on March 21, 1969, in a Bloomfield Hills civil ceremony presided over by a church elder.[24][25] The following day the couple flew to Utah for a wedding ceremony at the Salt Lake Temple.[24][25]
In order to be closer to her, Romney began attending Brigham Young University as well.[8] Romney had missed much of the American anti-Vietnam War movement and associated tumult while away, and was surprised to find out that his father had turned against the war during his ill-fated 1968 presidential campaign.[19] The circumstances of his father's loss would grate on Mitt for decades.[12] Regarding his own status in terms of the military draft, Romney had initially gotten a student deferment, then like most other Mormorn missionaries he had received a ministerial deferment while in France.[19][26] Following his return, Romney got another student deferment.[26] When those ran out and he became eligible for military service in 1970, his high number in the annual draft lottery (300) meant he would not be drafted.[12][19][26]
At the culturally conservative Brigham Young, Romney continued to be sheltered from much of the upheaval of the era, and did not join in the few protests against the war or against the LDS Church's policy against giving full membership to blacks.[12][19] He became president of an all-male social club and showed a newfound discipline in his studies.[19] In his senior year he took time off to return to Michigan to work as a driver and advance man for his mother Lenore Romney in her eventually unsuccessful 1970 campaign for the U.S. Senate.[12][24] He graduated from Brigham Young in 1971, earning a Bachelor of Arts in English and giving commencement addresses to both his own College of Humanities and to the university's entire graduating class.[nb 2]
The Romneys' first son, Tagg, was born in 1970[24] while both were undergraduates at Brigham Young,[27] living in a $75-a-month basement apartment.[19] They subsequently had Matt (born 1971), Josh (born 1975), Ben (born 1978) and Craig (born 1981).[24] Ann Romney's work as a stay-at-home mom would enable her husband to pursue his career, first in business and then in politics.[28]
Romney still wanted to pursue a business career, but his father, who by now was serving in President Richard Nixon's cabinet as U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, recommended that a law degree would be valuable.[29] Thus Romney became one of only 15 students to enroll at the recently-created joint Juris Doctor/Master of Business Administration four-year program coordinated between Harvard Law School and Harvard Business School.[30] Fellow students noted Romney's strong work ethic and buttoned-down appearance;[30] he lived in a Belmont, Massachusetts house with Ann and by now two children.[24] He graduated in 1975 cum laude from the law school, representing a standing in the top third of that class, and was named a Baker Scholar for graduating in the top five percent of his business school class.[30][31]
Business career
Romney was heavily recruited and, after graduation, chose to remain in Massachusetts and go to work for Boston Consulting Group, thinking that working as a management consultant to a variety of companies would prepare him for a future job as a chief executive.[29][9][32] Romney's legal and business education proved valuable in this role, and he quickly became a rising star.[29]
In 1977 he was hired away by Bain & Company, a hot new management consulting firm in Boston that had been formed a few years earlier by Bill Bain and other former Boston Consulting Group employees.[29][33] Bain would later say of the thirty-year-old Romney, "He had the appearance of confidence of a guy who was maybe ten years older."[34] With Bain & Company, Romney proved adept at learning the "Bain way", which consisted of immersing itself in each client's business,[29][34] and not simply to issue recommendations, but to stay with the company until they were effectively changed for the better.[33][35] With a record of success with clients such as the Monsanto Company, Outboard Marine Corporation, Burlington Industries, and Corning Incorporated, Romney became a vice president of the firm in 1978 and within a few years one of the its best consultants.[8][29][32] Romney became a firm believer in Bain's methods; he later said, "The idea that consultancies should not measure themselves by the thickness of their reports, or even the elegance of their writing, but rather by whether or not the report was effectively implemented was an inflection point in the history of consulting."[33]
Romney was restless for a company of his own to run, and in 1983 Bill Bain offered him the chance to head a new venture that would buy into companies, have them benefit from Bain techniques, and then reap higher rewards than just consulting fees.[29] Romney was initially cautious about accepting the offer, and Bain re-arranged the terms in a complicated partnership structure so that there was no financial or professional risk to Romney.[29][34][36] Thus, in 1984, Romney left Bain & Company to co-found the spin-off private equity investment firm, Bain Capital.[35] Bain and Romney spent a year raising the $37 million in investment money needed to start the new operation.[32][34] As general partner of the new firm, Romney was frugal and cautious, spending little on office appearance and finding the weak spots in so many potential deals that by 1986, very few had been done.[29] At first, Bain Capital focused on venture capital opportunities.[29] Their first big success came with a 1986 investment to help start Staples Inc., after founder Thomas G. Stemberg convinced Romney of the market size for office supplies; Bain Capital eventually reaped a nearly sevenfold return on its investment.[29]
Romney soon switched Bain Capital's focus from startups to the relatively new business of leveraged buyouts: buying existing firms with money mostly borrowed against their assets, partnering with existing management to apply the "Bain way" to their operations (rather than the hostile takeovers practiced in other leverage buyout scenarios), and then selling them off in a few years.[29][34] Bain Capital lost most of its money in many of its early leveraged buyouts, but then started finding successes with spectacular returns.[29] Indeed, during the 14 years Romney headed the company, Bain Capital's average annual internal rate of return on realized investments was 113 percent.[32] Romney excelled at presenting and selling the deals the company made.[36] The firm initially gave a cut of its profits to Bain & Company, but Romney later persuaded Bain to give that up.[36]
The firm successfully invested in or acquired many well-known companies such as Accuride, Brookstone, Domino's Pizza, Sealy Corporation, Sports Authority, and Artisan Entertainment, as well as lesser-known companies in the industrial and medical sectors.[29][34][37] Romney's cautious instincts were still in force at times; he wanted to drop a Bain Capital hedge fund that initially lost money, but other partners prevailed and it eventually gained billions.[29] He also personally opted out of the Artisan Entertainment deal, not wanting to profit from a studio that produced R-rated films.[29] Romney was on the board of directors of Damon Corporation, a medical testing company later found guilty of defrauding the government; Bain Capital tripled its investment before selling off the company, with the fraud being discovered by the new owners (Romney was never implicated).[29]
Leveraged buyouts such as those Bain Capital did sometimes led to layoffs.[29][36] Of these, Romney later said, "Sometimes the medicine is a little bitter but it is necessary to save the life of the patient. My job was to try and make the enterprise successful, and in my view the best security a family can have is that the business they work for is strong."[36] Bain Capital's acquisition of Ampad exemplified a deal where it profited handsomely from early payments and management fees, even though the subject company itself ended up going into bankruptcy.[29] Bain was among the private equity firms that took the most such fees, and more cases happened as Romney was leaving the firm.[34] He said in retrospect, "It is one thing that if I had a chance to go back I would be more sensitive to. It is always a balance. Great care has got to be taken not to take a dividend or a distribution from a company that puts that company at risk. [Taking a big payment from a company that later failed] would make me sick, sick at heart."[34]
In 1990, Romney was asked to return to Bain & Company, which was facing financial collapse.[35] He was announced as its new CEO in January 1991[38][39] (but drew only a symbolic salary of one dollar).[35] Romney managed an effort to restructure the firm's employee stock-ownership plan, real-estate deals and bank loans, while rallying the firm's thousand employees, imposing a new governing structure that included Bain and the other founding partners giving up control, and increasing fiscal transparency.[29][32][35] Within about a year, he had led Bain & Company through a highly successful turnaround and returned the firm to profitability without further layoffs or partner defections.[32] He turned Bain & Company over to new leadership and returned to Bain Capital in December 1992.[29][39][40]
During his years in business, Romney did not neglect his religious duties. He tithed constantly, giving millions of dollars to the LDS Church.[20] He served as ward bishop for Belmont from 1984 to 1986, acting as the ecclesiastical and administrative head of his congregation.[41] From 1986 to 1994 he presided over the Boston Stake, which included more than a dozen congregations in eastern Massachusetts.[20][41][42]
Romney left Bain Capital in February 1999 to serve as the President and CEO of the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympic Games Organizing Committee.[29] By that time, Bain Capital was on its way to being one of the top private equity firms in the nation,[36] having increased its number of partners from 5 to 18, had 115 employees overall, and had $4 billion under its management.[34] Bain Capital's approach of applying consulting expertise to the companies it invested in became widely copied within the private equity industry.[43] His experience at Bain & Company and Bain Capital gave Romney a world view that was business oriented – centering around a hate of waste and inefficiency, and a love for data and charts and analysis and presentation, and a belief in keeping an open mind and seeking opposing points of view – that he would take with him to the public sector.[35][9] As a result of his business career, by 2007 Romney and his wife had a net worth of between $190 and $250 million, most of it held in blind trusts.[44] Although gone, Romney received a passive profit share as a retired partner in some Bain Capital entities.[44] An additional blind trust existed in the name of the Romneys' children and grandchildren that was valued at between $70 and $100 million.[45]
1994 U.S. senatorial campaign
Main article: United States Senate election in Massachusetts, 1994
Romney had been thinking about entering politics for a while.[24] He decided to take on longtime incumbent Democratic Senator Ted Kennedy, who was more vulnerable than usual in 1994 – in part because of the unpopularity of the Democratic Congress as a whole and also because this was Kennedy's first election since the William Kennedy Smith trial in Florida, in which Kennedy had taken some public relations hits regarding his character.[46][47] Romney changed his affiliation from Independent to Republican in October 1993 and formally announced his candidacy in February 1994.[24] He stepped down from his position at Bain Capital during the run.[8]
Romney came from behind to win the Massachusetts Republican Party's nomination for U.S. Senate after advertising on television heavily, gaining overwhelming support in the state party convention, and then defeating businessman John Lakian in the September 1994 primary with over 80 percent of the vote.[8][48][49] In the general election, Kennedy faced the first serious re-election challenger of his career in the young, telegenic, and very well funded Romney.[46] Romney ran as a fresh face, as a successful entrepreneur who stated he had created ten thousand jobs, and as a Washington outsider with a strong family image and moderate stands on social issues.[46][50] Romney stated: "Ultimately, this is a campaign about change."[51] After two decades out of public view, his father George re-emerged during the campaign as well.[52][53]
Romney's campaign was effective in portraying Kennedy as soft on crime, but had trouble establishing its own positions in a consistent manner.[54] By mid-September 1994, polls showed the race to be approximately even.[46][55][56] Kennedy responded with a series of attack ads, which focused both on Romney's seemingly shifting political views on issues such as abortion and on the treatment of workers at a paper products plant owned by Romney's Bain Capital.[46][57][58] Kennedy and Romney held a widely watched late October debate without a clear winner, but by then Kennedy had pulled ahead in polls and stayed ahead afterward.[59] Romney spent over $7 million of his own money, with Kennedy spending more than $10 million from his campaign fund, mostly in the last weeks of the campaign (this was the second-most expensive race of the 1994 election cycle, after the Dianne Feinstein–Michael Huffington Senate race in California).[60]
In the November general election, despite a disastrous showing for Democrats overall, Kennedy won the election with 58 percent of the vote to Romney's 41 percent,[29] the smallest margin in Kennedy's eight re-election campaigns for the Senate.
2002 Winter Olympics
Romney returned to Bain Capital the day following his senatorial campaign, but still smarted from the loss, and told his brother, "I never want to run for something again unless I can win."[24][61] His father died in 1995 and his mother in 1998, and Romney felt restless as the decade neared a close; the goal of just making more money was losing its appeal to him.[24][61] He had stepped down as Boston Stake president in order to run for the Senate, and while still teaching Sunday School, was largely uninvolved in the long and somewhat controversial construction of a Mormon temple in Belmont.[41] Ann Romney was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1998; Romney described watching her fail a series of neurological tests as the worst day of his life.[24] After two years of severe difficulties with the disease, she found in Park City, Utah (where the couple had built a vacation home) a mixture of mainstream, alternative, and equestrian therapies that gave her a lifestyle mostly without limitations.[28] When the offer came for Romney to take over the troubled 2002 Olympic Winter Games, to be held in Salt Lake City in Utah, she urged him to take it, and eager for a new challenge, he did.[61][62] On February 11, 1999, Romney was hired as the new president and CEO of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee.[63]
Before Romney came on, the event was running $379 million short of its revenue benchmarks.[63] Plans were being made to scale back the games to compensate for the fiscal crisis and there were fears the games might be moved away entirely.[64] The Games had also been damaged by allegations of bribery involving top officials, including prior Salt Lake Olympic Committee president and CEO Frank Joklik. Joklik and committee vice president Dave Johnson were forced to resign.[65]
Romney revamped the organization's leadership and policies, reduced budgets, and boosted fund raising. He soothed worried corporate sponsors and recruited many new ones.[61][66] He admitted past problems, listened to local critics, and rallied Utah's citizenry with a sense of optimism.[61] Romney worked to ensure the safety of the Games following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks by ignoring those who suggested the games be called off and coordinating a $300 million security budget.[62][67] He became the public face of the Olympic effort, appearing in countless photographs and news stories and even on Olympics souvenir pins.[61] Romney's omnipresence irked those who thought he was taking too much of the credit for the success, or had exaggerated the state of initial distress, or was primarily looking to improve his own image.[61][66] Overall he oversaw a $1.32 billion budget, 700 employees, and 26,000 volunteers.[63]
Despite the initial fiscal shortfall, the Games ended up clearing a profit of $100 million,[68] not counting the $224.5 million in security costs contributed by outside sources.[69] Romney broke the record for most private money raised by any individual for an Olympics games, summer or winter.[62] His performance as Olympics head was rated positively by 87 percent of Utahns.[70]
Romney and his wife contributed $1 million to the Olympics, and he donated to charity the $1.4 million in salary and severance payments he received for his three years as president and CEO.[71] He wrote a book about his experience titled Turnaround: Crisis, Leadership, and the Olympic Games. Romney was widely praised for his successful efforts with the 2002 Winter Olympics[62] including by President George W. Bush,[43] and it solidified his reputation as a turnaround artist.[66] The role gave him experience in dealing with federal, state, and local entities, a public persona he had previously lacked, and the chance to re-launch his political aspirations.[61] Indeed, Romney was mentioned as a possible candidate for statewide office in both Massachusetts and Utah, and also as possibly joining the Bush administration.[62][72][73]
Governor of Massachusetts
2002 gubernatorial campaign
Main article: Massachusetts gubernatorial election, 2002
In 2002, Republican Acting Governor Jane Swift's administration was plagued by political missteps and personal scandals.[70] Many Republicans viewed her as a liability and considered her unable to win a general election against a Democrat.[74] Prominent GOP activists campaigned to persuade Romney to run for governor.[72] One poll taken at that time showed Republicans favoring Romney over Swift by more than 50 percentage points.[75] In March 2002, Swift decided not to seek her party's nomination, and so Romney was unopposed in the Republican party primary.[70][76]
Massachusetts Democratic Party officials claimed that Romney was ineligible to run for governor, citing residency issues involving Romney's time in Utah as president of the Salt Lake City Olympic Committee.[77] In June 2002, the Massachusetts State Ballot Law Commission unanimously ruled that Romney was eligible to run for office.[77]
Romney ran as a political outsider again.[70] Supporters of Romney hailed his business record, especially his success with the 2002 Olympics, as the record of someone who would be able to bring a new era of efficiency into Massachusetts politics.[76] The campaign was the first to use microtargeting techniques, in which fine-grained groups of voters were reached with narrowly tailored messaging.[78] Romney contributed over $6 million to his own campaign during the election, a state record at the time.[79][70] Romney was elected Governor in November 2002 with 50 percent of the vote over his Democratic opponent, Massachusetts State Treasurer Shannon O'Brien, who received 45 percent.[80]
Tenure, 2003–2007
Main article: Governorship of Mitt Romney
Official Massachusetts State House portrait of Governor Mitt Romney. Artist Richard Whitney.
Romney was sworn in as the 70th governor of Massachusetts on January 2, 2003. Both houses of the Massachusetts state legislature held large Democratic majorities.[81] He picked his cabinet and advisors more on managerial abilities than partisan affiliation.[9] Upon entering office in the middle of a fiscal year, Romney faced an immediate $650 million shortfall and a projected $3 billion deficit for the next year.[73] Unexpected revenue of $1.0–1.3 billion from a previously enacted capital gains tax increase and $500 million in unanticipated federal grants decreased the deficit to $1.2–1.5 billion.[82][83] Through a combination of spending cuts, increased fees, and removal of corporate tax loopholes, by 2006 the state had a $600–700 million surplus.[73][84][82]
Romney supported raising various fees by more than $300 million, including those for driver's licenses, marriage licenses, and gun licenses.[73][82] Romney increased the state gasoline fee by 2 cents per gallon, generating about $60 million per year in additional revenue.[73][82] Romney also closed tax loopholes that brought in another $181 million from businesses over the next two years.[73] The state legislature, with Romney's support, also cut spending by $1.6 billion, including $700 million in reductions in state aid to cities and towns.[85] The cuts also included a $140 million reduction in state funding for higher education, which led state-run colleges and universities to increase tuition by 63 percent over four years.[73][82] Romney sought additional cuts in his last year as Massachusetts governor by vetoing nearly 250 items in the state budget, but all of them were overridden by the Democratic-dominated legislature.[86]
The combined state and local fee burden in Massachusetts increased during Romney's governorship but still was below the national average.[73] According to the Tax Foundation, that per capita burden was 9.8 percent in 2002 (below the national average of 10.3 percent), and 10.5 percent in 2006 (below the national average of 10.8 percent).[87]
Romney was at the forefront of a movement to bring near-universal health insurance coverage to the state, after a business executive told him at the start of his term that doing so would be the best way he could help people.[88] After positing that any measure adopted not raise taxes and not resemble the previous decade's failed "Hillarycare" proposal, Romney formed a team of the state's top experts that beginning in late 1994 came up with a set of proposals more innovative and ambitious than incremental ones from the Democratic legislature.[88][9][89] In particular, Romney successfully pushed for incorporating an individual mandate at the state level.[4] Past rival Ted Kennedy, who had made universal heath coverage his life's work and who over time developed a warm relationship with Romney,[90] gave Romney's plan a positive reception, which encouraged Democratic legislators to work with it.[88][89] The effort eventually gained the support of all major stakeholders within the state, and Romney helped break a logjam between rival Democratic leaders in the legislature.[88][89]
On April 12, 2006, Romney signed the resulting Massachusetts health reform law, which requires nearly all Massachusetts residents to buy health insurance coverage or face escalating tax penalties such as the loss of their personal income tax exemption.[91] The bill also establishes means-tested state subsidies for people who do not have adequate employer insurance and who make below an income threshold, by using funds previously designated to compensate for the health costs of the uninsured.[92][93][94] He vetoed eight sections of the health care legislation, including a controversial $295-per-employee assessment on businesses that do not offer health insurance and provisions guaranteeing dental benefits to Medicaid recipients.[91][95] The legislature overrode all eight vetoes; Romney's communications director Eric Fehrnstrom responded by saying, "These differences with the Legislature are not essential to the goal of getting everyone covered with insurance."[95] Romney said of the measure overall, "There really wasn't Republican or Democrat in this. People ask me if this is conservative or liberal, and my answer is yes. It's liberal in the sense that we're getting our citizens health insurance. It's conservative in that we're not getting a government takeover."[88] The law was the first of its kind in the nation and became the signature achievement of Romney's term in office.[89][nb 3]
Governor Mitt Romney poses with a prototype of a one hundred dollar laptop in September 2005, after filing a proposal to give every public middle and high school student in Massachusetts one of the machines. The legislation did not pass.
At the beginning of his governorship, Romney opposed same-sex marriage and civil unions, but advocated tolerance and supported some domestic partnership benefits.[96][97][89] Faced with the dilemma of choosing between same-sex marriage or civil unions after the November 2003 Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court decision legalizing same-sex marriages (Goodridge v. Department of Public Health), Romney reluctantly backed a state constitutional amendment in February 2004 that would have banned same-sex marriage but still allow civil unions, viewing it as the only feasible way to ban same-sex marriage in Massachusetts.[98] In May 2004 Romney instructed town clerks to begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, but citing a 1913 law that barred out-of-state residents from getting married in Massachusetts if their union would be illegal in their home state, no marriage licenses were to be issued to out-of-state same-sex couples not planning to move to Massachusetts.[99][96] In June 2005, Romney abandoned his support for the compromise amendment, stating that the amendment confused voters who oppose both same-sex marriage and civil unions.[96] Instead, Romney endorsed a petition effort led by the Coalition for Marriage & Family that would have banned same-sex marriage and made no provisions for civil unions.[96] In 2004 and 2006 he urged the U.S. Senate to vote in favor of the Federal Marriage Amendment.[100][101] Romney's position on some other social issues, such as abortion rights, abstinence-only sex education, and therapeutic cloning, also evolved into a more conservative stance during his time as governor.[89]
Romney generally used the bully pulpit approach towards promoting his agenda, staging well-organized media events to appeal directly to the public rather than pushing his proposals in behind-doors sessions with the state legislature.[89] Romney was especially effective in dealing with a crisis of confidence in Boston's Big Dig project following a fatal ceiling collapse in 2006, wresting control of the project from the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority and helping ensure that it would eventually complete.[89]
During 2004, Romney spent considerable effort trying to bolster the state Republican Party, but it failed to gain any seats in the state legislative elections that year.[73][102] Given a prime-time appearance at the 2004 Republican National Convention, Romney was already being discussed as a potential 2008 presidential candidate.[103] Midway through his term, Romney decided that he wanted to stage a full-time run for president,[104] and on December 14, 2005, Romney announced that he would not seek re-election for a second term as governor.[105][106] As chair of the Republican Governors Association, Romney traveled around the country, meeting prominent Republicans and building a national political network;[104] he spent part or all of more than 200 days out of state during 2006, preparing for his run.[107] Romney's frequent out-of-state travel contributed towards declining his approval rating declining in public polls towards the end of his term.[108] He conceded that 2006 would be a difficult year for Republicans and that they would likely lose gubernatorial seats, including possibly his own.[108] The weak condition of the Republican state party was one of several factors that led to Democrat Deval Patrick's lopsided win over Republican Kerry Healey in the 2006 Massachusetts gubernatorial election.[108]
Romney filed to register a presidential campaign committee with the Federal Election Commission on his next-to-last day in office as governor.[109] Romney's term ended January 4, 2007.
2008 presidential campaign
Main article: Mitt Romney presidential campaign, 2008
See also: Republican Party (United States) presidential primaries, 2008
Romney holding an "Ask Mitt Anything" session in Ames, Iowa in May 2007.
Romney formally announced his candidacy for the 2008 Republican nomination for president on February 13, 2007, at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan.[110] In his speech, Romney frequently invoked his father and his own family and stressed experiences in the private, public, and voluntary sectors that had brought him to this point.[110][111] He said, "Throughout my life, I have pursued innovation and transformation,"[111] and casting himself as a political outsider, said, "I do not believe Washington can be transformed from within by a lifelong politician."[112]
The assets that Romney's campaign began with included his résumé of success in the business world and his rescuing of the Salt Lake Olympics,[104][113] which matched the commonly held notion that American industry had star players who could straighten out what was wrong in the nation's capital.[114] Romney also had solid political experience as governor together with a political pedigree courtesy of his father, a strong work ethic and energy level, and a large, wholesome-looking family that seemed so perfect as to be off-putting to some voters.[104][113][115] Ann Romney, who had become an outspoken advocate for those with multiple sclerosis,[116] was in remission and would be an active participant in his campaign,[117] helping to soften his image.[115] Moreover, with his square jaw, handsome face, white teeth, and full head of dark hair graying slightly at the temples, Mitt Romney looked like a president.[35][118][84][119] Romney's liabilities included having run for senator and served as governor in one of the nation's most liberal states, having taken some positions there that were opposed by the party's conservative base, and subsequently shifting those positions.[104][113][117] The candidate's Mormon religion was also viewed with suspicion and skepticism by some in the Evangelical portion of the party;[120] polls indicated that about a quarter of Republican voters, and a quarter of voters overall, said they were less likely to vote for a candidate who was a Mormon.[121][122]
Romney speaking in October 2007 before the Values Voter Summit in Washington, D.C..
Romney assembled for his campaign a veteran group of Republican staffers, consultants, and pollsters.[113][123] He was little-known nationally, though, and stayed around the 10 percent range in Republican preference polls for the first half of 2007.[104] Romney's strategy was to win the first two big contests, the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary, and carry the momentum and visibility gained through the big Super Tuesday primaries and on to the nomination.[123] He proved the most effective fundraiser of any of the Republican candidates,[124] with his Olympics ties helping him with fundraising from Utah residents and from sponsors and trustees of the games.[71] He also partly financed his campaign with his own personal fortune.[113] These resources, combined with his August 2007 win in the Iowa Straw Poll and the mid-year near-collapse of nominal front-runner John McCain's campaign, made Romney a threat to win the nomination and the focus of the other candidates' attacks.[125] Romney's staff suffered from internal strife and the candidate himself was indecisive at times, constantly asking for more data before making a decision.[113][126] Persistent questions about the role of religion in Romney's life, as well as Southern Baptist minister and former Governor of Arkansas Mike Huckabee's rise in the polls based upon an explicitly Christian-themed campaign, led to the December 6, 2007, "Faith in America" speech.[122] In it, Romney said he should neither be elected nor rejected based upon his religion,[127] and echoed Senator's John F. Kennedy's famous speech during his 1960 presidential campaign in saying "I will put no doctrine of any church above the plain duties of the office and the sovereign authority of the law."[122] Romney largely avoided discussing the specific tenets of his faith, instead stressing that he would be informed by it and that, "Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom. Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone."[122][127]
Mitt and Ann Romney in late December 2007 at a campaign event in Londonderry, New Hampshire
In the January 3, 2008, Iowa Republican caucuses, the first contest of the primary season, Romney received 25 percent of the vote and placed second to the vastly outspent Huckabee, who received 34 percent.[128][129] Of the 60 percent of caucus-goers who were evangelical Christians, Huckabee was supported by about half of them while Romney by only a fifth.[128] A couple of days later, Romney won the lightly-contested Wyoming Republican caucuses.[130] At a Saint Anselm College debate, Huckabee and McCain pounded away at Romney's image as a flip flopper.[128] Indeed, this label would stick to Romney through the campaign; his position changes on abortion, gun control, and gay rights especially led to accusations of opportunism and hypocrisy[113] (charges that Romney rejected as unfair and inaccurate except for his acknowledged change of mind on abortion).[115] Romney seemed to approach the campaign as a management consulting exercise, and showed a lack of personal warmth and political feel; journalist Evan Thomas wrote that Romney "came off as a phony, even when he was perfectly sincere."[115][131] (Romney's staff would conclude that competing as a candidate of social conservatism and ideological purity rather than of pragmatic competence had been a mistake.[115][132])
Romney at a rally in Michigan in mid-January 2008
Romney finished in second place by five percentage points to the resurgent McCain in the next-door-to-his-home-state New Hampshire primary on January 8.[128] Romney rebounded to win the January 15 Michigan primary over McCain by a solid margin, capitalizing on his childhood ties to the state and his vow to bring back lost automotive industry jobs which was seen by several commentators as unrealistic.[nb 4] On January 19, Romney won the lightly-contested Nevada caucuses, but placed fourth in the intense South Carolina primary, where he had effectively ceded the contest to his rivals.[133] McCain gained further momentum with his win in South Carolina, leading to a showdown between him and Romney in the Florida primary.[134][135]
For ten days, Romney campaigned intensively on economic issues and the burgeoning subprime mortgage crisis, while McCain repeatedly and inaccurately asserted that Romney favored a premature withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq.[nb 5] McCain won key last-minute endorsements from Florida Senator Mel Martinez and Governor Charlie Crist, which helped push him to a five percentage point victory on January 29.[134][135] Although many Republican officials were now lining up behind McCain,[135] Romney persisted through the nationwide Super Tuesday contests on February 5. There he won primaries or caucuses in several states, including Massachusetts, Alaska, Minnesota, Colorado and Utah, but McCain won more, including large states such as California and New York.[136] Trailing McCain in delegates by a more than two-to-one margin, Romney announced the end of his campaign on February 7 during a speech before the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington.[136] Altogether, Romney had won 11 primaries and caucuses,[137] received about 4.7 million total votes,[138] and garnered about 280 delegates.[139] Romney spent $110 million during the campaign, including $45 million of his own money.[140]<
Romney endorsed McCain for president a week later.[139] He soon founded the Free and Strong America PAC, a political action committee whose stated mission was to raise money for other Republican candidates and to promote Republican policies.[141] Romney became one of the McCain campaign's most visible surrogates, appearing on behalf of the GOP nominee at fundraisers, state Republican party conventions, and on cable news programs.[142] His efforts earned McCain's respect and the two developed a warmer relationship; he was on the nominee's short list for the vice presidential running mate slot, where his experience in matters economic would have balanced one of McCain's weaknesses.[143] McCain, behind in the polls, opted instead for a high-risk, high-reward "game changer" and selected Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin.[144] Romney continued to work for McCain's eventually unsuccessful general election campaign.
Activities after 2008
Following the election, Romney paved the way for a possible 2012 presidential campaign by keeping much of his PAC's money to pay for salaries and consulting fees for his existing political staff[141] and to build up a political infrastructure for what might become a $1 billion campaign three years hence.[132] He also had a network of former staff and supporters around the nation who were eager for him to run again.[145] In February 2009, Romney delivered a speech at the annual CPAC convention. There he won the 2012 presidential straw poll with 20%, leading many to think that he may emerge as the front runner in the 2012 race.[146] The Romneys sold their main home in Belmont and their ski house in Utah, leaving them an estate in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, along Lake Winnipesaukee, and an oceanfront home in La Jolla, San Diego, California that they had bought the year before.[132][147][148][149] Both locations were near some of the Romneys' grandchildren,[147] who by 2010 numbered fourteen.[150] The San Diego location was also ideal for Ann Romney's multiple sclerosis therapies and for recovering from her late 2008 diagnosis and lumpectomy for mammary ductal carcinoma in situ.[147][151] Romney maintained his voting registration in Massachusetts, however, and was looking to buy a condominium in the Boston area.[132][148][152]
In April 2009, Romney avoided questions about his political future by saying he was writing a book on "the challenges America faces".[153] He continued to give speeches and raise campaign funds on behalf of fellow Republicans,[154] but turned down many potential media appearances so as not to become overexposed.[132]
A June 2009 CNN/Opinion Research Corporation national poll showed Romney as the 2012 presidential co-favorite of the Republican electorate along with Palin and Mike Huckabee.[155] The same month, a Pew Research Center poll found that among the general public, 40 percent viewed him favorably and 28 percent unfavorably.[156] This was a marked improvement from the days of his 2008 presidential campaign, where his unfavorable ratings had been higher than his favorables.[156] Romney also stood to gain from the Republican electorate's tendency to nominate candidates who had previously run for president before.[145]
Following the August 2009 death of his past rival and sometime ally Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Romney declared that he had no interest in running in the special January 2010 election to replace him.[157] Romney was an early supporter of Scott Brown, the successful Republican candidate in that race. Some of Romney's former aides were used by Brown's campaign and Romney raised funds for Brown.[158][159]
A January 2010 National Journal poll of political insiders found that a majority of Republican insiders, and a plurality of Democratic insiders, predicted Romney would become the party's 2012 nominee.[160]
In February 2010, Romney had a minor altercation with LMFAO musical group member Skyler Gordy, known as Sky Blu, on an airplane flight.[nb 6]
Romney's book, No Apology: The Case for American Greatness, was released on March 2, 2010; an 18-state promotional book tour was undertaken.[161] Romney said he would work to elect Republican candidates in the 2010 elections, and would decide after that whether to stage a presidential campaign.[162] Immediately following the March 2010 passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, Romney attacked the landmark legislation as "an unconscionable abuse of power" and said the act should be repealed.[163] The hostile attention it held among Republicans created a potential problem for the former governor, since the new federal law was in many ways similar to the Massachusetts health care reform passed during Romney's term; as one Associated Press article stated, "Obamacare ... looks a lot like Romneycare."[163] While acknowledging that his plan was not perfect and still was a work in progress, Romney did not back away from it; he focused on its having had bipartisan support in the state legislature, while the Obama plan received no Republican support at all in Congress.[163] Also, a Romney spokesperson stated: "Mitt Romney has been very clear in all his public statements that he is opposed to a national individual mandate. He believes those decisions should be left to the states."[164]
On April 10, 2010, Romney won the 2012 Southern Republican Leadership Conference Straw Poll, defeating second place finisher Ron Paul by one vote while Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich tied for third.[165][166][167] Romney campaigned heavily for Republican candidates around the nation in the 2010 midterm elections,[168] and raised the most funds of any of the prospective 2012 Republican presidential candidates.[169]
Public image
Main article: Public image of Mitt Romney
Mitt Romney is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, colloquially known as the Mormon church.[170] For privacy and religious reasons, Romney has avoided speaking publicly about specific church doctrines, and pointed out that the U.S. Constitution prohibits religious tests for public office.[171]
Political positions
For more details on specific Romney positions on many issues, see Political positions of Mitt Romney.
Mitt Romney during an "Ask Mitt Anything" session at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College before several hundred students
For much of his business career, Romney had no tangible record of political positions taken.[172][173] Until his 1994 U.S. Senate campaign, he was registered as an Independent.[24] In the 1992 Democratic Party presidential primaries, he had voted for the Democratic former senator from the state, Paul Tsongas.[172][174]
In the 1994 Senate race, Romney explicitly aligned himself with Republican Massachusetts Governor William Weld, who believed in fiscal conservatism and supported abortion rights and gay rights, saying "I think Bill Weld's fiscal conservatism, his focus on creating jobs and employment and his efforts to fight discrimination and assure civil rights for all is a model that I identify with and aspire to."[175]
As a candidate for, and then as, Governor of Massachusetts, Romney at first again generally operated in the mold established by Weld and followed by Weld's two other Republican successors, Paul Cellucci and Swift: restrain spending and taxing, be tolerant on social issues, protect the environment, be tough on crime, try to appear post-partisan.[176][174] However, Romney's position on certain social issues, including same-sex marriage, abortion rights, and abstinence-only sex education, evolved into a more conservative stance during his time as governor.[89] The change on abortion drew particular attention and was the result of what Romney described as an epiphany; he later said, "Changing my position was in line with an ongoing struggle that anyone has that is opposed to abortion personally, vehemently opposed to it, and yet says, 'Well, I'll let other people make that decision.' And you say to yourself, but if you believe that you're taking innocent life, it's hard to justify letting other people make that decision."[89]
That this aligning with traditional conservatives on social, and additionally foreign policy, issues coincided with Romney's becoming a candidate for the Republican nomination for President[177][178] caused many skeptics, including a number of Republicans, to charge Romney with opportunism and having a lack of core principles.[89][174][179][113] Romney generally responds to criticisms of ideological pandering with remarks like, "The older I get, the smarter Ronald Reagan gets."[117]
While there have been many biographical parallels between the lives of George Romney and his son Mitt,[nb 7] one particular difference is that while George was willing to defy political trends, Mitt has been much more willing to adapt to them.[4][9] Mitt Romney has said that learning from experience and changing views accordingly is a virtue, and that, "If you're looking for someone who's never changed any positions on any policies, then I'm not your guy."[179] Journalist and author Daniel Gross sees Romney as approaching politics in the same terms as a business competing in markets, in that successful executives do not hold firm to public stances over long periods of time, but rather constantly devise new strategies and plans to deal with new geographical regions and ever-changing market conditions.[174] Writer Robert Draper holds a somewhat similar perspective: "The Romney curse was this: His strength lay in his adaptability. In governance, this was a virtue; in a political race, it was an invitation to be called a phony."[115]
Indeed, throughout his business, Olympics, and political career, Romney's instinct has been to apply the "Bain way" towards problems.[180][178][115] Romney has said, "There were two key things I learned at Bain. One was a series of concepts for approaching tough problems and a problem-solving methodology; the other was an enormous respect for data, analysis, and debate."[180] Romney believes the Bain approach is not only effective in the business realm but also in running for office and, once there, in solving political conundrums such as proper Pentagon spending levels and the future of Social Security.[178][180] Former Bain and Olympics colleague Fraser Bullock has said of Romney, "He's not an ideologue. He makes decisions based on researching data more deeply than anyone I know."[43] Romney's technocratic instincts have thus always been with him; in his public appearances during the 2002 gubernatorial campaign he sometimes gave PowerPoint presentations rather than conventional speeches.[181] Upon taking office he became, in the words of The Boston Globe, "the state's first self-styled CEO governor."[73] During his 2008 presidential campaign he was constantly asking for data, analysis, and opposing arguments,[178] and has been viewed as a potential 'CEO president' should he get that far.[174]
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