What Is Mitt Romney Hiding?
Mitt Romney’s campaign is well-versed in the art of secrecy. Hard drives from state-owned computers while he was governor of Massachusetts? Purchased by his staffers and erased. The 23 years of tax returns he provided to the McCain campaign in 2008 while being vetted (and passed over) for vice president? Under lock and key. The details of millions of dollars of his investments with Bain Capital? Romney won’t say. The identities of people who are bundling millions of dollars in campaign contributions? Refuses to tell.
What’s perhaps most surprising — and troubling — is Romney’s refusal to take positions on some of the most important issues of the day. For example, Romney had no problem attacking the president over Friday’s immigration policy announcement, yet he refused to say when asked five separate times in a single interview whether he’d repeal the policy if elected president.
ThinkProgress’ Josh Israel rounds up seven key issues that Mitt Romney refuses to take a position on:
1. Romney won’t say whether he would undo Obama’s decision to end deportations of DREAM-eligible immigrants. Romney and his campaign passed up numerous opportunities over the weekend to say whether he agreed with the substance of the Obama administration’s order to stop deporting some young undocumented immigrants and whether a President Romney would rescind the order, saying only, “We’ll look at that — we’ll look at that setting as we– as we reach that.”
2. Romney won’t say whether he’d support the Paycheck Fairness Act. Romney repeatedly dodged questions about whether he’d support the Paycheck Fairness Act, a bill to crack down on wage discrimination and close the wage gap between men and women. His campaign didn’t respond to five requests by the conservative Washington Times seeking his stance on the bill.
3. Romney won’t specify which tax loopholes he’d close. Asked yesterdaywhich tax deductions he would eliminate to offset his massive proposed tax-cuts for the rich, Romney refused to offer any specifics on a plan that he has admitted is so vague it cannot even be scored, saying only, “We’ll go through that process with Congress.”
4. Romney won’t say which federal agencies he’d eliminate. At a private fundraiser, Romney reportedly told donors he would eliminate or combine “a lot of departments in Washington,” but that he was “probably not going to lay out just exactly which ones are going to go.” Why? Because he feared telling the voters his plans before the election might hurt his political chances, just as it did in his 1994 Senate race.
5. Romney won’t say whether he supports the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.Romney’s campaign refused to say whether he would have signed the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, a law that helps women hold employers accountable for discriminating in the pay practices based on gender. Romney said, “I’m not going to go back and look at all the prior laws and say had I been there which ones would I have supported and signed.”
6. Romney won’t say whether he’d support full reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act. Offering only general support for renewal of the Violence Against Women Act, Romney would not specify whether he supported the bipartisan Senate version or the GOP House rolllback bill. His spokeswoman said only that he “hopes [the bill] can be reauthorized without turning it into a political football.”
7. Romney won’t say whether say whether he’d eliminate the “carried interest” tax break for private equity partners. Romney’s campaign has refused to answer questions about whether he supports eliminating the “carried interest” tax break for private equity partners, even when asked directly,saying only that we should probably “take a close look at to see if we’re treating capital gains as capital gains or are we treating, in some cases, carried interest as capital gains when it’s more like ordinary income.”
Evening Brief: Important Stories That You May Have Missed
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Frank Rich on negative campaigning.
Mitt Romney messed up the name of a famous East Coast gas station chain where he was dazzled by a common electronic device.
Anti-immigration sentiment is at a historic low.
More staunch conservatives are saying that President Obama’s immigration announcement is “the right thing to do.”
Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio arrested a 6 year-old undocumented immigrant.
Catholic nuns kick off nine-state bus tour to protest House Republican budget cuts.
House Republicans are on the verge of killing 1.9 MILLION jobs.
Notorious anti-immigrant politician Russell Pearce is having a hard time finding places that will let him throw a fundraiser.