Senator Mitt Romney, a Utah Republican, downplayed concerns about President-elect Donald Trump’s “retribution” of his political rivals in an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper Sunday morning.
“Trump has made it clear that he wants to go after his political opponents…are you worried at all about being a target for retribution?” Tapper asked the senator on State of the Union.
Romney responded: “No, actually I’ve been pretty clean throughout my life. I’m not particularly worried about criminal investigations. I don’t know how much, by the way, of what the president says is hyperbole…I think President Trump is likely to try and focus on the future.”
Romney has been critical of Trump in the past, and even during Sunday’s interview with Tapper, he said, “I’m, as you know, not a supporter of President Trump’s.”
The senator, who will be retiring in January, voted to convict Trump both times after he was impeached during his first presidency, becoming the first Republican senator ever to vote to convict a president of their own party.
Romney, who was the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, told Tapper on Sunday about Trump, “I didn’t support him in this election. I didn’t the last time he ran either, largely for matters of character.”
However, he did acknowledge the rise in popularity of Trump and his Make America Great Again (MAGA) political movement among the Republican Party.
“MAGA is the Republican Party and Donald Trump is the Republican Party today,” he said.
This is a developing story and will be updated as more information becomes available.
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