Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, who has spent the last few days campaigning in Nevada, sat down with Jon Ralston of “Face to Face with Jon Ralston” Wednesday and defended former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney’s recent gaffe about the poor.
“There is very little I agree with him on economic policy, but I don’t agree that Mitt Romney doesn’t care about the poor,” Mr. Paul posited.
Mr. Paul comments were in reaction to the Bain Capital co-founder’s widely-criticized remarks on CNN Wednesday. “I’m in this race because I care about Americans. I’m not concerned about the very poor. We have a safety net there. If it needs repair, I’ll fix it,” Mr. Romney told CNN’s Soledad O’Brien. Although Mr. Romney later tried to clarify his comments, the damage was already done.
On his way to Minnesota Wednesday, Mr. Romney tried to explain gaffe. “No, no, no. You’ve got take the whole sentence, alright, it’s mostly the same,” Mr. Romney told reporters on a plane, according to The Associated Press. “If there are people that are falling through the cracks, I want to fix that,” Mr. Romney added.
Mr. Paul, who rarely attacks the former Massachusetts governor, declined to talk in depth about Mr. Romney’s remarks. However, Mr. Paul posited that Mr. Romney may have been misquoted or that the quotes may have been taken out of context.
“I don’t know in what context he’s saying that. I’m not going to analyze what he was really thinking and what his intent was. I know that he has been misquoted before and in the context of things I’d let him explain that,” Mr. Paul told Mr. Ralston.
Mr. Romney is the front-runner in Nevada, having won the latest Las Vegas Review Journal poll of likely Nevada Republican caucus voters Thursday.
