Though they were once fierce rivals during the 2016 election season, in recent months it looked like President Donald Trump and former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney had buried the hatchet.
Appearances can be deceiving, though, and recent remarks by Romney indicate that he may not yet be prepared to throw his support behind Trump’s 2020 re-election effort. Watch below:
JUST NOW: @MittRomney says it’s “too early” to say he will support Trump in 2020 pic.twitter.com/8EmHDbqoIM
— Kasie DC (@KasieDC) July 2, 2018
The Washington Examiner reported that Romney was asked by MSNBC host Kasie Hunt to clarify his prior statements regarding the strong likelihood that Trump would be re-elected in 2020 and if he would vote for Trump in that re-election bid.
“It’s too early to say who I will support,” replied Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts and GOP candidate who is now running for a Senate seat in Utah.
“Yeah, I did say I think he’ll get re-elected, that’s not an endorsement,” he continued.
“I mean, I also think that (Democrat gubernatorial candidate) Gavin Newsom will get elected in California, that’s not something I want to see, it’s just something that’s probably gonna happen,” he added.
Romney was then asked for his thoughts on if he’d like to see a challenge against Trump for the GOP nomination in 2020.
“There will be people who decide, I presume, to get in a Republican primary,” was Romney’s reply.
Mitt Romney was a bitter critic of then-candidate Trump during the 2016 election, and Trump didn’t have too many nice things to say about Romney at that time either, but the two seemed to have worked out their differences over the intervening months in spite of the previous harsh words.
[show_poll poll_id=545]
In fact, Trump even endorsed Romney’s bid to represent the state of Utah in the Senate … an endorsement that it seems Romney is not yet willing to reciprocate.
Romney may have his reasons for withholding support for Trump’s re-election at this time, but those reasons likely won’t hold much weight with the president’s ardent supporters, and Romney’s ambiguity could end up costing him in his own bid for elected office.