Trump responds to Romney’s comments at rally

He praised Trump for saying China was cheating the United States, saying Donald was shooting straight.

Mitt Romney, the Republican party candidate for the 2012 presidential election in the U.S., says Donald Trump, the party’s front runner for 2017, is poised to lead the country into recession.

Santelli referenced the October 2012 presidential debate between then-Republican nominee Romney and President Barack Obama in which the candidates traded barbs about whether Obama had called the attacks in Benghazi an “act of terror”. As he spoke in Utah, Ryan said on Capitol Hill that “conservatism is being disfigured” by some of Trump’s ideas and statements.

Romney pointed to Trump’s refusal to release his tax returns and initial reluctance to disavow an endorsement from a former leader of the Ku Klux Klan white supremacist group.

Trump was asked during Thursday’s presidential debate who he considers to be the best people to oversee US national security. Party elites were pouring over complicated delegate math, outlining hazy scenarios for a contested convention and even flirting with the long-shot prospect of a third party option. Some Republicans hope that if a contested convention occurs, elected Trump delegates could defect to support a more establishment-friendly candidate.

He was also dismissive of Mr Romney’s criticisms, describing him as a failed candidate who once begged for Mr Trump’s endorsement. Because party rules require an outright majority to win the nomination, members of the stop Trump coalition have started calling on people to vote for the most viable alternative in each state. “Dishonesty is Donald Trump’s hallmark”, Romney said during a 20-minute address that mostly focused on Trump’s campaign.

Today’s early-round victim was Mitt Romney, who somehow thought if he reminded voters Trump is “a phony and a fraud” who has sometimes failed in business and likes to talk about his rivals in public the way we all talk about our rivals in private, they would flee the billionaire’s cause in droves. “Trump is directing our anger for less than noble purposes”, Romney added. “And the other, an oppressive government that would lead America down a darker, less free path”.

Axelrod noted thousands of Republicans had already voted for Trump in primary elections. “I also wonder if this is going to fracture the Republican Party”.

Trump reportedly told the Times that he was flexible on some aspects of the plan. “Sometimes, reality is stranger than fiction around here these days”. And I think he actually has the guts to really make change and make it fast, and we really need it fast.

With Trump emerging as the undisputed GOP front-runner, many party leaders and insiders insist he’s not a true conservative.

“I would also echo the many concerns about Mr. Trump’s uninformed and indeed unsafe statements on national security issues”, said McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Still, Trump is not yet on track to claim the nomination before the party’s national gathering in July, according to an Associated Press delegate count. He has won 46 percent of the delegates awarded so far, and he would have to increase that to 51 percent in the remaining primaries.

Party strategists cast March 15 as the last opportunity to stop Trump through the normal path of winning states and collecting delegates. The GOP mayhem contrasts sharply with a clearer picture on the Democratic side, where Hillary Clinton is drawing broad support from voters and her party’s leaders. Rival Sen. Bernie Sanders has vowed to keep up his fight, though his path to the nomination has become exceedingly narrow.

While there have been multiple big pushes in the “Never Trump” movement, Romney marks a large and visible step forward: the party’s most recent nominee wrote a speech meant specifically to take down Trump. Of the 59 respondents, slightly fewer than half could not commit to backing him in November.