Romney's Other Comments on Muslims in the Cabinet

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

MITT ROMNEY

In addition to the comments at the fundraiser to Mansoor Ijaz (see interview below), Talking Points Memo spotlighted comments from two Nevadans describing comments by Mitt Romney about Muslims at a separate event.

Aguirre says Romney made the comments three months ago at Lawry's restaurant in Las Vegas, at a different event from the one chronicled in the Monitor op-ed. Aguirre says that she was at the event with local Republican George Harris, who asked Romney the relevant question. She described the exchange this way:
"His question was something to the effect of, `Considering the problems that we have with the Jihadist movement and the problems we have with the Middle East, would you consider having a Muslim as an adviser that can guide you as to what kind of decisions to make with regards to the Middle East?'"
"He said, `Probably not.'"
Aguirre added that what Romney said next surprised her. "He said something to the effect of, `They're radicals. There's no talking to them. There's no negotiating with them.' I can't remember the exact words he used, but that was the explanation. We left thinking, `Wow, what a racist comment. He automatically assumed that all Muslims are radical.'"
Harris, a self-described registered Republican who's also the state GOP finance chair and who asked Romney the question, confirmed this account in a telephone interview with TPM Election Central.
"My question was, `Look, with the amount of Muslims that don't trust the United States, would you consider it prudent to put a Muslim in your cabinet?' He said, `Most likely not.' And he went on to say what Irma said he said. I was more angry than she was. I said, `I'm not gonna support this guy.' If he's gonna be President of the United States, don't you think you need to be a little more open minded?"

As in the circumstances surrounding Ijaz's question, the Romney campaign has not offered a flat denial of the statement — i.e., "he didn't say that." They have responded by stating to reporters "Governor Romney doesn’t hire people solely based on their religion, race or ethnicity. As governor, Mitt Romney had a diverse Cabinet with women and minorities. There were people of many different backgrounds in senior positions, and they were selected based on their skills and qualifications. That’s the same approach he’ll bring to the White House" and "What Governor Romney typically says is that he doesn't have a quota box that he checks off for Muslims or any other minority. He hires the most qualified people, irrespective of their ethnic or religious background."

By the way, Captain Ed and I talked about this yesterday on his web program - Ijaz did indeed contribute to the Clintons back in the 1990s. Ed thinks this is enough to earn Ijaz the label of "Clintonite" and felt the Christian Science Monitor should have mentioned it; he sees Ijaz's op-ed as an attempt to whack Romney from a Clinton-friendly source. I think that if Ijaz is a Clintonite, the term is now broader and more stretched out than "neocon." Ijaz must be one of those Clintonites who writes for NRO, The Washington Times, Newsmax, the Weekly Standard, is a terrorism analyst for Fox News, etc. We can argue about whether Ijaz is being fair to Romney, but the argument that he's some closet lefty doesn't hold much water. (Riehl World View concurs.)

As I noted, if he's a Clintonite, what's he doing donating to Romney?

11/28 09:20 AM Share