Mitt Romney: Trump’s First Year Was “Very Similar To Things I’d Have Done My First Year”

Mitt Romney thinks the Trump administration has been better than expected because it has done a bunch of things that he would have done in his first year as president:

“Former GOP presidential nominee and current Senate candidate Mitt Romney praised President Trump’s first year in office on Tuesday, saying it was similar to what the first year of a Romney administration would look like.

In response to a question from a voter in Utah, Romney seemed to indicate that he largely approved of the policies pursued by the Trump administration during Trump’s first year in the White House, calling it “better than expected,” the Washington Examiner reports.

“His first year is very similar to things I’d have done my first year,” Romney said. “The things he’s actually done have been better than I expected.” Romney quickly added, however, that he would continue to oppose the president if he said something the former Massachusetts governor viewed as “racist” or “divisive.” …”

I agree with Mitt Romney.

If Romney had been elected president in 2012, he would have dramatically increased defense spending. He would have attacked Syria twice. He would have spent his political capital on tax cuts and Obamacare. He would have appointed Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court and other conservative judges. He would have pushed through the Heritage Foundation’s agenda of deregulation.

President Romney would have been subservient to Israel and would have “stood up to Iran.” He would have put the interests of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States above “America First.” He would have imposed massive sanctions on Russia and sold weapons to Ukraine. He would have maintained the NATO alliance. He would have put neocons like Mike Pompeo, Nikki Haley and John Bolton in charge of American foreign policy and national security.

President Romney would be looking for a way to reenter the Trans-Pacific Partnership. He would have worn a yarmulke and prostrated himself before Benjamin Netanyahu at the Western Wall in Israel. He would have unquestionably signed the Charlottesville Resolution. He would have observed the pieties of political correctness and gone through the motions of celebrating the entire multiculturalist calendar. He would have signed the omnibus. He would have enforced immigration laws about to the same extent as George W. Bush while increasing H-2B visas. He would have talked tough about immigration during the campaign (Romney endorsed self-deportation) while carefully maintaining the status quo in office. He would have pardoned Sholom Rubashkin, Scooter Libby and Jack Johnson.

President Romney would have also turned a blind eye to Antifa violence. He wouldn’t have been interested in doing anything about assaults on his own supporters. He wouldn’t regulate Big Tech because monopolies and censorship are part of the magic of the free market. He would have congratulated himself over the rise in the stock market while ignoring student loan debt. He would have opened up new lands to offshore drilling for energy corporations. A major part of the President Romney agenda would be paying for the tax cut by cutting entitlement spending as “welfare.”

Under President Romney, conservatives would have continued to lose ground in the culture war while pushing neoliberal economics to new extremes. Confederate monuments would have still been torn down. America’s racial demographics would have continued to change. American culture would have become more sordid. The most that could be said of the Romney administration is that it would have slowed down the Democrats from advancing their agenda in some ways.

America wouldn’t be in any sense “great again” after President Romney left office and in fact would be worse off than ever before. We would still be tumbling toward the inevitable mid-century reckoning albeit I imagine these years would have passed in a more dignified manner.