Search

EVANSVILLE, Ind. -- When Mitt Romney campaigned last week at one stop in Colorado, a key swing state whose governor and senators are Democrats, he sought to sell himself with a simple message: He is a deal maker, someone who can work with Democrats and reach across the aisle, as he did when he was the governor of Massachusetts. ''We've got to have someone that goes to Washington that buries the hatchet and says, 'You know what? There are good Democrats, there are good Republicans that care about America,' '' Mr. Romney said at a rally in a Denver suburb. ''Let's work together to get the American people working.'' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

WASHINGTON -- Senator Harry Reid's decision this week to hurl a taunting, unsubstantiated accusation at Mitt Romney is hardly out of character for the cantankerous Democratic leader of the Senate, who revels in provocative comments and once called Mr. Romney ''kind of a joke.'' On a personal level, Mr. Reid has long been publicly contemptuous of Mr. Romney, the presumptive Republican nominee and a fellow Mormon. In 2008, he said Mr. Romney would have been ''a tremendous drag'' on the Republican ticket. Last year, he said Mr. Romney ''doesn't stand for anything.'' And in the last month, he has said that Mr. Romney could not be confirmed as a dogcatcher or a cabinet secretary. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

JERUSALEM -- Mitt Romney offended Palestinian leaders on Monday by suggesting that cultural differences explain why the Israelis are so much more economically successful than Palestinians, thrusting himself again into a volatile issue while on his high-profile overseas trip. His remarks drew a pointed rebuke from the Palestinian leadership, which angrily noted that Mr. Romney had failed to mention the years of trade restrictions imposed by Israel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

RENO, Nev. -- On the eve of a trip abroad intended to burnish his qualifications to be commander in chief, Mitt Romney accused Obama administration officials on Tuesday of betraying the country by leaking national security secrets for their own political gain and failing to stand up to adversaries like China, Russia and Iran. Mr. Romney's address, at the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention here, was the most expansive foreign policy speech of his candidacy and opened a new and aggressive attack on President Obama on national security. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

RENO, Nev. -- President Obama directed a sharp assault on Mitt Romney's foreign policy credentials on Monday, as the weekend political truce that followed the shooting rampage in Colorado dissolved into the more familiar political punch and counterpunch. In a speech before the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention here, during which he never once mentioned Mr. Romney by name, Mr. Obama nonetheless directly took on the latest salvo from the Romney camp -- Mr. Romney's recent assertion that America under Mr. Obama is in decline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

WASHINGTON -- So long, Victory Column. Hello, Gdansk Shipyard? Next week, Mitt Romney will dive into a rite of passage for presidential candidates: the big trip overseas to burnish foreign policy credentials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Romney campaign unveiled an advertisement on Wednesday that contends that under President Obama, stimulus money went to the president's political donors and to overseas companies. THE SCRIPT [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

President Obama's campaign has unveiled an attack ad arguing that Mitt Romney's tax plan is a sop to the wealthy. The ad will run in swing states: Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia. THE SCRIPT ''The choice on taxes. Mitt Romney's plan: A 25 percent tax cut for millionaires. Tax breaks for oil companies and corporations that shift jobs overseas. But a tax hike for 18 million working families. President Obama's plan: Ask the wealthy to pay a little more so the middle class pays less. Eliminate oil subsidies and tax breaks for companies that outsource. Two plans. Your choice.'' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

WASHINGTON -- As President Obama and Mitt Romney rush to define the other, each man is alleging one of the great economic sins: that his rival accelerated the exodus of American jobs to foreign countries. Mr. Obama accuses Mr. Romney of being at the helm of a firm that invested in companies that outsourced their jobs. Mr. Romney, in remarks on Tuesday, called Mr. Obama the real ''outsourcer in chief'' for sending billions of dollars in stimulus funds to foreign-based firms and companies that ''end up making their products outside the United States.'' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It seemed a ripe opportunity for Mitt Romney: The crisis that unfolded last month over the Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng was a way to hammer President Obama as weak on human rights and unwilling to be assertive with China. Inside the campaign, though, sharp differences emerged among staff members and foreign policy advisers as the crisis deepened and Mr. Chen left the protection of the United States Embassy in Beijing. Some advisers cautioned of the dangers of plunging too quickly into the middle of a fast-moving diplomatic crisis and wanted Mr. Romney to have a political margin of safety in case of a sudden breakthrough, according to people close to the campaign. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

WASHINGTON -- Mitt Romney's recent declaration that Russia is America's top geopolitical adversary drew raised eyebrows and worse from many Democrats, some Republicans and the Russians themselves, all of whom suggested that Mr. Romney was misguidedly stuck in a cold war mind-set. But his statement was not off the cuff -- and it was not the first time Mr. Romney had stirred debate over his hawkish views on Russia. Interviews with Republican foreign policy experts close to his campaign and his writings on the subject show that his stance toward Russia reflects a broader foreign policy view that gives great weight to economic power and control of natural resources. It also exhibits Mr. Romney's confidence that his private-sector experience would make him a better negotiator on national security issues than President Obama has been. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Richard Grenell, an openly gay and longtime Republican foreign policy spokesman hired last month by Mitt Romney's campaign, abruptly resigned on Tuesday after antigay elements in the party criticized his appointment and some Republican advisers said Mr. Grenell had been sidelined by the campaign during a busy foreign policy week. The Romney campaign issued a statement saying that it had sought to keep Mr. Grenell from quitting. And according to some Republicans, while Mr. Grenell's sexual orientation was not an issue for the campaign, the Romney team had cut Mr. Grenell out of the loop on some issues after feeling a surprising pressure from some social conservatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PORTSMOUTH, N.H. -- Mitt Romney said on Monday that ''even Jimmy Carter'' would have issued the order to kill Osama bin Laden in Pakistan a year ago, dismissing President Obama's suggestion that Mr. Romney, the presumptive Republican nominee, would not have followed the same path as the president. The swipe at the White House, delivered casually on the rope line of a campaign event here, touched off a pointed exchange with Mr. Obama, who quickly accused Mr. Romney of flip-flopping on an issue that the president has put at the center of his re-election campaign. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Shifting the battle with Mitt Romney from jobs and taxes to the safer realm of foreign policy, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. traveled to New York City on Thursday to praise President Obama as the man who got Osama bin Laden and to paint Mr. Romney as a cold war relic who would leave American troops stranded in Afghanistan. The president, Mr. Biden said in a speech at New York University, ended the war in Iraq, devised an exit strategy in Afghanistan and restored America's moral stature. Mr. Romney, he asserted, has distorted that record and would drag the United States back to the go-it-alone policies of the Bush administration that culminated in the Iraq war. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mitt Romney has made Afghanistan a showcase for his attacks on President Obama's foreign policy. He says Mr. Obama has undercut American interests by setting timetables for withdrawing troops, providing the Taliban -- who displayed their resilience with attacks over the weekend -- further reason to wait things out. He called Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta ''misguided and so naive'' for announcing plans to hand over primary combat responsibilities to Afghan forces next year and leave American troops mainly in training and other roles. But despite the tough critique, Mr. Romney has loosely embraced the main thrust of White House policy for troop levels after the election: a timetable for pulling out nearly all troops by the end of 2014. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

WEST MONROE, La. -- Rick Santorum on Friday recalibrated a remark he made a day earlier suggesting that the United States would be just as well off re-electing President Obama as it would be electing Mitt Romney in November. Speaking to a crowd of several hundred people at a shooting range in northern Louisiana, Mr. Santorum made a point of saying Friday morning that he would back whoever is the Republican presidential nominee in the fall. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

WEST CHESTER, Ohio -- With Mitt Romney pulling out a pair of victories on Tuesday night, the pressure is on Rick Santorum to prove he remains a viable challenger by scoring at least a handful of major wins five days from now on Super Tuesday. And his main target is Ohio, where Christian conservatives and working-class voters provide a tempting demographic mix for his comeback effort. Expectations are high: polls taken before Tuesday's Michigan and Arizona primaries showed Mr. Santorum running strongly against Mr. Romney here in Ohio, in some ways the most important state to vote next Tuesday and a crucial swing state in the fall. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

DETROIT -- As the battle for the Republican nomination moves to the Midwest, Mike DeWine, a former senator and the attorney general of Ohio, abruptly defected from Mitt Romney's camp on Friday and endorsed Rick Santorum, saying Mr. Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, stands a better chance of defeating President Obama. ''People like him and they relate to him,'' Mr. DeWine said of Mr. Santorum in a telephone interview. ''They think he's real and they think he's human.'' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

DETROIT -- Faced with explaining his opposition to the 2008 rescue of the automobile industry to an audience of Detroit business leaders on Thursday, Rick Santorum attacked his chief rival, Mitt Romney, who also opposed the industry's bailout, for treating Wall Street differently from Detroit. Mr. Santorum, who is locked in a tight Michigan primary race with Mr. Romney, argued in a speech to the Detroit Economic Club that Mr. Romney was inconsistent for supporting the Wall Street bailout known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, while objecting to billions of dollars in federal loans to the auto industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LAKE JACKSON, Tex. -- Once there was a challenge of a softball game from the Ron Paul clan to the Mitt Romney clan. ''They didn't show up,'' Mr. Paul says. ''We didn't schedule it. We really razz them about that, 'You guys chickened out!' '' When Mr. Paul's campaign jet broke down last year in Wolfeboro, N.H., Mr. Romney's wife, Ann, offered to let Mr. Paul, an aide and one of his granddaughters stay the night at their summer home on Lake Winnipesaukee. When Mr. Romney arrived later, he offered his jet to take them home to Texas. Mr. Paul, not wanting to impose, was grateful but declined both offers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LAKE JACKSON, Tex. -- Ron Paul says he has by no means given up on winning the Republican presidential nomination, but he acknowledges that he might not make it. ''The odds are right now that Romney, he pulls it off,'' Mr. Paul, a Texas congressman, said in an interview here. ''But he doesn't even have a guarantee in a week. That whole thing can shift rather quickly.'' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

MANCHESTER, N.H. -- Representative Ron Paul of Texas finished a strong second in the state's Republican primary on Tuesday, which in many ways was the more telling outcome in a race where Mitt Romney's dominance was never in doubt. Mr. Paul polled well ahead of the late-surging Jon M. Huntsman Jr., who ran third, and Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum, who battled for fourth. Mr. Paul benefited from the large turnout of independent voters, getting the nod from about a third, a little more than Mr. Romney. He also did well with young voters and those who said they were liberal on social issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

NEWPORT, N.H. -- Jon M. Huntsman Jr. was in jeopardy of arriving late to his own rally here the other night. But his wife's desperate need for caffeine forced them to stop for gas-station blend at the Bradford Market, where an admiring clerk added to their delay. ''You have a working knowledge of China,'' the clerk, Jason Reid, told Mr. Huntsman, the ambassador to China until last spring. Mr. Reid said he would vote Huntsman in the Republican presidential primary on Tuesday. But, calling himself ''a realist,'' he added, ''Say Romney does get the nomination or something like that: could you see yourself working in an executive position for him in some capacity?'' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

6:51 p.m. Updated MOUNT PLEASANT, S.C. - Gov. Rick Perry of Texas and Representative Michele Bachmann have joined other candidates, including Mitt Romney, in passing on Donald Trump's Dec. 27 debate in Iowa. Mr. Perry's campaign issued this statement on Thursday: Governor Perry has talked to Donald Trump in recent days and respects him and the folks at NewsMax very much. There are two debates in the next seven days. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Mitt Romney may be skipping some major G.O.P. events in Iowa this week, but he's still got his eye on someone who isn't: his rival Rick Perry. According to The Associated Press, Mr. Romney's campaign on Thursday paid for automated phone messages to Iowans that assert that the Texas governor has fostered illegal immigration. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

FAIRFAX, Va. -- Mitt Romney's critics are quick to accuse him of being a flip-flopper on important issues, part of an effort by Democrats and his Republican rivals to establish him as a politician without a core. Mr. Romney gave them new ammunition on Wednesday by appearing to waffle on whether he supports tough anti-union legislation in Ohio that is up for a vote on a referendum in that state. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

As several leading Republican presidential candidates embrace a flat tax as a core campaign position, one contender stands out in not doing so: Mitt Romney, who has a long record of criticizing such plans and famously derided Steve Forbes's 1996 proposal as a ''tax cut for fat cats.'' Lately, though, his tone has been more positive. ''I love a flat tax,'' he said in August. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

12:46 p.m. Updated Gov. Rick Perry of Texas, still reeling from a debate performance that upset many of the bedrock conservatives he considers his base, came out swinging Friday against his rival Mitt Romney, accusing the former Massachusetts governor of backing policies indistinguishable from those of President Obama and having ''paved the way for Obamacare.'' While Mr. Perry has already been sharply critical of Mr. Romney and his health care record, the Texan's speech before the Georgia Public Policy Foundation was a more intensive critique and seemed to reflect a strategy to undercut Mr. Romney's attempts to draw away Perry supporters and other Republican voters. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

WASHINGTON -- Moments after making remarks in Jerusalem about Middle East culture that enraged Palestinians and undermined the public relations value of his trip to Israel, Mitt Romney looked around the room for Dan Senor, one of his campaign's top foreign policy advisers. It was Mr. Senor's book about entrepreneurs in Israel that informed his comments, Mr. Romney explained to the group of Jewish-American donors he had assembled at the King David hotel. The book, ''Start-up Nation,'' is among Mr. Senor's writings that Mr. Romney frequently cites in public. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

His candidacy all but dismissed just days ago, Rick Santorum won the Minnesota and Colorado caucuses and a nonbinding primary in Missouri on Tuesday, an unexpected trifecta that raised fresh questions about Mitt Romney's ability to corral conservative support. With his triumphs, Mr. Santorum was also suddenly presenting new competition to Newt Gingrich as the chief alternative to Mr. Romney, the front-runner. Where Mr. Gingrich has won one state, South Carolina, Mr. Santorum has now won four, including Iowa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Mitt Romney, facing his greatest challenge of the campaign so far, relentlessly pressed Newt Gingrich on Thursday night in their final debate before the Florida primary, seeking to regain the offensive against an insurgent challenge that has shaken his claim to inevitability. On immigration, personal finances and the grand ideas that have been the trademark of Mr. Gingrich's candidacy, Mr. Romney gave his rival no quarter, giving prime time voice to his campaign's all-out, round-the-clock assault on Mr. Gingrich here. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- For the Republican presidential candidates who want to stop Mitt Romney in South Carolina, it comes down to this: How far are they willing to go? A day after Mr. Romney's victory in New Hampshire left his rivals running out of time to block his path to the nomination, he was greeted here by a wave of attacks on his business record, his past support for abortion rights and his character. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on issues involving the attempt of U.S. presidential candidate Mitt Romney to undercut the President Barack Obama's 2009 auto bailout narrative. It notes that Romney has characterized the bailout plan of Obama as based on his approach. Meanwhile, it says that Obama has released a commercial campaign calling Romney's advertisement false and reiterating.

The article reports on the presidential debate between candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney on foreign policy issue. The debate was moderated by Bob Schieffer as the candidates offered different views of the world. It adds that the contrasting statements of both candidates were a matter of perspective.

It was the biggest moment yet for Mitt Romney's foreign policy team: a conference call last Thursday, dialed into by dozens of news outlets from around the globe, to dissect and denounce President's Obama record on national security. But Richard Grenell, the political strategist who helped organize the call and was specifically hired to oversee such communications, was conspicuously absent, or so everyone thought. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

CORRECTION APPENDED MONTGOMERY, Ala. -- For weeks, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich have been echoes of each other, both aiming their urgent verbal fire at Mitt Romney, the man they are desperate to stop from becoming the leader of the Republican Party. But the political and geographical imperatives of two important Southern primaries next week are forcing the two men to turn on each other as they seek to demonstrate an ability to unite the party's fickle conservative base. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- A reluctant Republican Party is increasingly showing signs of rallying around Mitt Romney in the presidential race, with leading members of Congress and influential conservatives signaling that a coast-to-coast burst of voting on Super Tuesday should mark a moment to start concentrating on defeating President Obama. Two leading fiscal conservatives declared their loyalties for the first time on Sunday, with one, Representative Eric Cantor of Virginia, the majority leader, saying, ''Mitt Romney is the man for this year.'' The other, Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, described Mr. Romney as ''best equipped to solve the urgent problems before us.'' [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

GREENVILLE, S.C. -- Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney came within minutes of bumping into each other at Tommy's Country Ham House here on Saturday morning. But though they never crossed paths at the restaurant, hundreds of supporters of each candidate shared long communal tables and debated their man's merits while waitresses juggled plates of eggs, bacon and grits. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

CORRECTION APPENDED MANCHESTER, N.H. -- Campaign advisers to former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, stung by unexpectedly fierce attacks from Republican rivals on his career as a corporate buyout specialist, are scrambling to avoid a prolonged and nasty battle over his business record before it does lasting damage to the front-runner. Although the advisers had always expected that Democrats would malign Mr. Romney's work of buying and selling companies, they were largely unprepared for an assault that came so early in the campaign and from within the ranks of their own party, those involved in the campaign discussions said. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BEDFORD, N.H. -- Mitt Romney fought to keep an upper hand in the Republican presidential race on Monday as his rivals sought to slow his march to the nomination and raise doubts about his electability by branding him as a job-killing corporate villain. As New Hampshire voters prepared to cast ballots Tuesday in the nation's first primary, Mr. Romney found himself on the unfamiliar terrain of defending his business pedigree against fellow Republicans as his challengers tried to tap into a populist sentiment. He played into the criticism with a handful of missteps, with rivals jumping on him for having suggested that he, too, has feared getting ''a pink slip.'' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

MANCHESTER, N.H. -- As candidates spent the weekend trying to catch up to Mitt Romney in New Hampshire, with the primary just two days away, a longtime supporter of Newt Gingrich donated $5 million to a ''super PAC'' backing his presidential bid, providing a major boost to Mr. Gingrich's ailing campaign. The donation by Sheldon Adelson was reported Saturday night by The Washington Post. He has long been a generous patron of Mr. Gingrich's political career. The super PAC, Winning Our Future, was formed last month by Becky Burkett, who served until earlier last year as chief development officer for American Solutions, a political action committee that Mr. Gingrich founded. The cash infusion from Mr. Adelson instantly catapults Winning Our Future into the top ranks of candidate super PACs, groups that can raise unlimited amounts of money from donors and spend it all on advertisements and other efforts to back a specific candidate, so long as they do not coordinate with the campaign. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]