Romney Stresses Differences With Two GOP Rivals
Former Mass. Governor Cites Strong Differences With McCain on Immigration and Campaign Finance

By Chris Cillizza and Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, June 6, 2007 6:54 PM

MANCHESTER, N.H. -- Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney advocated a policy of attrition to deal with the more than 12 million immigrants who are in the United States illegally, insisting that they can be slowly repatriated simply by enforcing current law or changing provisions of a controversial bipartisan plan pending in the Senate.

Romney said he had no desire to "round them up as one big group" and send illegal immigrants back to their native countries. Instead, he said the idea is "to take people who are here today and working here and replace them gradually and humanely with our own citizens as well as with legal immigrants who come in to take their place."

The former governor offered his views on immigration, health care and his leading opponents for the Republican presidential nomination during an interview for the washingtonpost.com's video interview program, "PostTalk."

Romney dismissed claims by proponents of the Senate's compromise bill that solving the immigration crisis is a difficult challenge requiring a delicately balanced coalition. "This is not rocket science," he said. "Getting the Iranians to not build a nuclear bomb? That's hard. Stopping the jihad? That's hard. But enforcing our border is relatively easy, relative to those things."

Romney said there is plenty of blame to go around for the failure to solve the problem of illegal immigration, saying the Bush administration, prior administrations and Congress had all failed to step up to the challenge. "They just have not been willing to do what's necessary to end illegal immigration," he said.

Romney's remarks on immigration came less than 24 hours after Republicans' third presidential debate, in which he passed on an opportunity to directly criticize Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) -- a leading advocate of a comprehensive reform bill and one of the governor's main rivals for the GOP nomination.

But in today's interview, Romney was more vocal about his differences with McCain, particularly on campaign finance reform.

"Senator McCain promoted the McCain-Feingold bill, which I'm afraid has made things worse, not better," he said.

The law, Romney said, has not stopped the flow of money but has shifted power from candidates and political parties to more shadowy organizations called 527s, which are exempt from the fundraising limits in the bill.

McCain also opposes these groups, known for the section of the tax code that governs their activities. When Romney was asked about McCain's shared opposition to 527s, he replied, "The law that he passed that is in place now in our country has created a circumstance where those 527s rule the day. That's what he put in place."

McCain's campaign quickly struck back, seeking to paint Romney as a flip-flopper on the issue.

"It comes as no surprise that Governor Romney fails to mention his past support for campaign finance reform when he attacks John McCain," said McCain spokesman Matt David. "Whether it's campaign finance reform, immigration or abortion, Romney's shifting positions and intellectually dishonest attacks illustrate his willingness to say and do anything in an effort to win the nomination."

Romney was less willing to explore differences with former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, the current frontrunner in the race for the Republican nomination according to national polling results. But Romney said his message to Republicans is that they must appeal to economic, defense and social conservatives to win.

"I call it the three legs of the Republican stool," he said, repeating a message from Tuesday night's debate.

Giuliani, in that same debate, said Republicans should unite around two principles -- staying on offense against terrorism and promoting economic policies that cut taxes. Without criticizing Giuliani directly, Romney said that platform will not win the White House for Republicans in 2008.

During the interview, Romney also addressed health care. In Massachusetts, he signed into a law a major reform that seeks to provide health insurance to all residents of the state. He touted the reform during Tuesday's debate, but stopped short of saying he would advocate a similar plan for the nation if he were elected president.

"I like the idea of letting the states be the laboratories of democracy," he said during the PostTalk interview. "Let them each develop their own plan to deal with their uninsured and to deal with their underinsured as we did, and have the federal government provide the flexibility in the funding they that normally provide the states to encourage, if you will, that kind of experimentation."

Romney said he opposed the idea of a "one-size fits all" federal solution to a problem like health care. But as a candidate for Senate in 1994, Romney favored a national welfare reform bill at a time when many states were experimenting with their own reforms, and he has defended President Bush's No Child Left Behind law, which imposes requirements on school systems across the country.

He said he saw no contradiction. When asked if he would require states to provide health insurance for their citizens, he said, "I don't think you require states to do that at this stage."

Romney said he expected former Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.) to enter the race but would not speculate on what impact he might have on the contest.

Cillizza reports for washingtonpost.com.