>>>
hi, everyone. i'm
tamron hall
. following reaction to
romney
's return. bitterness and regret just some of the words being used today to describe
mitt romney
and
ann romney
's first sit down interview since the defeat. here's
nicole wallace
, former senior adviser to
john mccain
's campaign earlier today on "
morning joe
."
>>
whenever you come out and talk about what went wrong there's just a -- sort of wreaks of the bitterness and the regret and hard to watch.
>>
i also remember watching the interview in
grad school
thinking, you know, that's not the future of the
republican party
and i must say with all due respect to governor
romney
, i had that feeling watching him, too.
>>
that's of course
bill kristol
and the romneys made it clear as the first read team said in the words and tone that they have not moved on from their loss.
>>
i look at what's happening right now. i wish i were there. it kills me not to be there. not to be in the
white house
doing what needs to be done.
>>
that was that crushing disappointment, not for us. our lives are going to be fine. it's for the country.
>>
romney
lingering on even as his
party
attempts to move forward. rebuild, rebrand. the future and past collided today in some ways with the gop.
romney
's sit down interview a day before
2016
prospect
jeb bush
made the rounds on morning shows in which bush spoke about where
romney
went wrong.
>>
governor
romney
put himself in a box i think in the primary by trying to out-conservative very good conservative candidates and never really recovered from it.
>>
joining me now, director of communications for american
cross roads
and former press secretary for the
national republican congressional committee
. thank you both for joining us.
>>
thank you.
>>
hi.
>>
what was your reaction to the interview?
bill kristol
says in a sense
romney
was yesterday.
>>
i think there's two interviews. the first part was the governor and
ann romney
looking back at what happened. i got bored with that.
looking forward
was i thought a little bit more interesting but at the same time
romney
suspect the head of the
party
anymore so i don't know how relevant it was to the future. there's a history of losing
presidential candidates
, doing the postmortem on the cam plains.
>>
he's not the head of the
party
but init haved to
cpac
when the guy referred to as the boss on "time" magazine
chris christie
is waiting on the invitation.
jonathan
, maybe some members of the
party
believe
romney
is part of the puzzle for the future.
>>
he will have interesting things to say about the campaign and what went wrong and we saw just in about every way the
obama campaign
was more robust than the
romney
campaign and a lot to the debate --
>>
give me a specific here. let me -- before you answer that, let me play what governor
romney
regardi ining minorities and how the minority vote factored in to the loss.
>>
i lost and so i'm not telling the
republican party
come listen to me. the guy who lost will tell you how to win.
>>
you must have ideas.
>>
of course. but among the ideas, clearly, we have to do a better job bringing joint voters in.
>>
danny
, bringing in minority voters but he didn't say how and certainly it's not by implying that people voted for the president because they wanted free
health care
or something along the lines of the 47% comment and he's not clearly explained.
>>
well, that's right. i think, you know, frankly this interview was not newsworthy in my personal opinion. interesting to see he was able to admit a big part of him losing the race is the fact he wasn't able to bring on minority voters, latinos and asians and blacks in a number that made a difference. i agree with you. it wasn't about being able to offer them goodies as he described it that the campaign of obama attracted.
ronald reagan
won states by being able to offer a vision hopeful and optimistic about the future. that's what we need to be able to get back to. we do better speaking to people's hopes and dreams and aspirations and not fears and desperations and angers. that's what we have done. we need to get back to basics and talk about the things of values and core principles that resonate with folks.
>>
so much of what happened in the campaign affects the
republican party
, immigration,
danny
. you have a great number of those within the
party
with the wake-up moment and looking for some kind of comprehensive, perhaps a great bipartisan plan that would include securing the borders and a path to citizenship. back to the inclusion or the issue of whether or not the
party
's one that's inclusive or wants to be exclusive, let's play what
romney
said regarding 47%.
>>
i didn't express myself as i wished i would have. you know, when you speak in private you don't spend as much time thinking about how something could be twisted and distorted and come out wrong but i did and very harmful. what i said is not what i believe.
>>
jonathan
, what confuses me about your reaction to mr.
romney
's interview, you point out he's not the leader of the
party
and could have good things to say at
cpac
with many conservatives there waiting i guess for some kind of direction, some type of leadership. he is on the roster for a reason and still can't quite explain that 47% comment and i do not believe that that will exclusively haunt governor
romney
. i believe it's haunting for the
party
for many people not to at least explain or justify what he was thinking.
>>
well, specifically, with minority outreach, i agree with
danny
, but i think that
immigration reform
specifically, legislative approach is part of it but as republicans we need to show up more, go to more local eve events. i don't know what he's talking about at the
cpac
conference. could be a postmortem to the campaign but
things to learn
from it.
>>
you learn nothing with a postmortem and didn't give you major headlines other than "the
washington post
" which said
ann romney
needs to move on but with that said,
jonathan
, if you had a choice of
chris christie
or
mitt romney
to the big conference, your conservative
cross roads
conference, who would you pick for moving forward?
>>
i would expect that
chris christie
would be invited there. i think he's spoke there in the past. we have great things happening at the state with republican governors.
>>
i want your thoughts on
ann romney
. let me play it.
>>
what about the
media
?
>>
i'm happy to blame the
media
.
>>
do you think the
media
was in the tank for
barack obama
?
>>
i think that it's any time you're running for office you always think that you're being portrayed unfairly and, you know, of course on our side believe there's more bias in favor of the other side. i think that, you know, that's a pretty universal -- universally felt opinion.
>>
danny
, is that what you feel? she didn't have to answer the question. she could say i want to talk about our role. she took the bait for right or for wrong.
>>
see, that's --
>>
she took it.
>>
i would like to blame the
media
for everything, too. what you deal with, you deal with --
>>
blame your parents or being poor parents or blame the
media
for how you turn out. she took that bait from
chris wallace
.
>>
but the reality is that you deal with the
media
that you have, not the
media
you wish you had. right? i think what we have right now as a
party
, as a perception problem. i think too many segments view us as intoll rat, insensitive. it is up to us to change that and made up of policies, plus principles plus politics. i think there are principles good and solid. i think our policies, i think we have a lot to learn from various communities in terms of how we shape our policies so they make sense and don't appear harsh and politics disastrous with too many segments of the population. that's fixable but i think unfortunately too many times we have had tone and tenor and rhetoric that's divisive and need to get away from that and talk about thing that is really are aspirational and optimistic for segments of the population that are looking for viable
national republican party
that has a different alternative than what the republicans were offering.
>>
thank you both for joining
Tags
Reacting to Romney