An End of an Era
Romney's Retirement is the Death Knell for Independent Thinkers in Government
I’ve always like Mitt Romney. I’d never voted for him,1 but I had tremendous respect for him as a legislator, as a businessman and as a person. He seemed to have a moral North Star separate from his own party or politics and had no trouble doing positive things even if they might damage his political fortunes.
As governor of Massachusetts,2 he had established the right-wing conservative answer to socialized health care. It created health care exchanges, provided subsidies for those below the poverty line and required all people to have health insurance. Conservatives praised the innovative governor for classic conservative principles in solving the health care crisis. In 2009, when Obama was to put together his health care proposal, rather than do what liberals wanted and expand Medicare to everyone, Obama went with Romney’s approach.3
When Romney first ran for President in 2008, he had gained some traction. He had strong appeal, spoke well before crowds and had gained a following. His Mormon faith was both a blessing and a curse; it was a positive in that there was a national base from which he could find campaign money and activists, but it was also viewed as a cult by many within the evangelical based within the GOP. He seemed ready to take off just before McCain resurged just before the Iowa Caucuses and coasted to the nomination.
In 2012, he became a more typical Republican politician. He said everything he needed to say, courted the right people, managed the media as good as one can. He was as vanilla a GOP candidate as vanilla gets. He didn’t seem like the Romney from before, almost like he was faking it to get to the White House. He lacked a certain genuineness. Nonetheless, he ran an A campaign. He even kicked Obama’s butt in the first debate.4 Still, he lost a race many Republicans thought was winnable and for that he was kind of cast out as a loser in the GOP.
Then came Trump.
Senator Romney
In 2016, Trump careened through the GOP primaries like a freight train demolishing everything in his path. That party that Romney had ran for in 2012 was in serious jeopardy of coming off the rails. Many in his home state of Utah reviled Trump and everything he represented. There was a push to get Romney to run as an independent for President, but he declined.5
With Trump’s win though, establishment Republicans were revulsed by the poor decisions, horrible reputation and disgusting policy ideas of the new President. Longtime Utah Senator Orrin Hatch had decided to retire and many in Utah thought Romney the perfect person to counter Trump’s worst impulses for the good of the party. Romney ran and easily won the Senate seat.
As a Senator, he sought out compromises and tried to work toward getting achievable results. It was often that the coalition of Romney, Lisa Murkowski (AK), Joe Manchin (WV) and Kirsten Synema (AZ) swayed bipartisan majorities for legislation. As a wealthy, nationally known, independent minded Senator, he was less beholden to the White House, fundraisers or powerful party brokers to succeed in Washington. The losing Presidential candidate made a fine junior Senator from Utah. He was even quite casual with expressing frustrations and grievances about the Republican President and the craven political coverage given to him by his spineless colleagues.
In 2020, after long thoughtful deliberations, carefully considering what had occured and assessing what his integrity required, he did what he thought was right based on the facts and voted to impeach the President. His Senate career took a tailspin. He was ostracized from much of the caucus.6 When January 6th happened he had no problem chastising other Republican Senators who he saw as promoting the insurrection and then ignoring it as “no big deal” afterwards.
And ultimately, that is what ended Romney’s career. Facing a re-election in 2024, he has instead decided to retire and spend what time he has left with family. The dissonance between what Senators say in public so they can get re-elected and who they are as people behind closed doors got to him. These are not serious people, at least not as serious as Romney was. They were hollow. The worst are full of passionate intensity while the best lack all conviction. I can’t blame him for being exasperated. I would be too.
I credit Romney for speaking his mind as a politician. It’s something that we see less of every day. He had principles. Even when he massaged those a little to get the GOP Presidential nomination, you had the feeling he genuinely felt dirty doing it and that it wasn’t really him. I wish more had the political guts to do the right thing; we all do. As Romney said, “There are worst things than losing an election; take it from someone who knows.”
PurpleAmerica’s Recommended Stories
If you have not yet read McKay Coppins’ excellent Atlantic article on Romney’s decision, do so right away.
One piece I want to share is this one. Romney was already upset about Trump’s Electoral fraud scheme and that certain Senators (Hawley and Cruz, who he both acknowledged are extremely smart but shallow political opportunists) role in promoting it. In this one paragraph, Romney was all of us watching the insurrection that day.
PurpleAmerica’s Obscure Fact of the Day
As the head of American Motor Car, George Romney, Mitt’s father, was responsible for giving us the AMC Gremlin. This car
PurpleAmerica’s Cultural Corner
In 2002, Salt Lake City hosted the Winter Olympics. You may be wondering, “Why Salt Lake City?” A big part of that was it’s chairperson, Mitt Romney, who worked particularly hard to bring the Olympics to Utah. Here’s the opening ceremonies. Enjoy!
PurpleAmerica’s Final Word
From The Atlantic article by McKay Coppins:
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Footnotes and Fun stuff
There was really only one occassion where I could, and in that election, voted for a second Obama term. I wasn’t thrilled with Obama’s first term but the GOP had gotten completely crazy and out of hand in the two years since the Tea Party takeover. It’s only gotten worse since then.
Yes kids, a mormon REPUBLICAN was once governor of the most liberal state in the country. Look it up.
This was a savvy bit of politics by Obama; Romney was already the frontrunner for the GOP nomination and either he would have to run on his successful health care plan while the rest of the GOP smothered it, or he would have to disown what was one if his greatest successes. He chose the latter.
Obama, who had seemed slow and off the whole night, blamed it on the altitude in Denver where the debate was held. That aside, Romney was just very good that evening.
Fellow Utahn Even McMullin ran instead, garnering a healthy GOP protest vote but still well short of getting a single Electoral Vote.
Though behind closed doors, other Republican Senators had no problem telling him how much they agreed with what he did.