VP Beat: Potential Picks Gather, Rubio Explains His Absence
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Hemera/Thinkstock(WASHINGTON) — ‘VEEPS’ DO PARK CITY: A number of vice presidential contenders are set to descend on Park City, Utah, this weekend for the exclusive donor retreat hosted by Mitt Romney, giving them the chance to show off their skills with donors and potentially get in some time with the candidate himself. ABC News’ Shushannah Walshe has the details here.
RUBIO CHOOSES KIDS OVER DONOR RETREAT: Sen. Marco Rubio wasn’t willing to compromise his family time to appear at a mega-donor retreat in Utah this week. “I’ve been on the road since Sunday with the book thing. I have to go to Orlando tomorrow for a speech, I have to be back in D.C. on Monday, on Sunday, on Meet the Press. And then I have a whole other week here. If I had gone to Utah, I wouldn’t see my kids for 15 days,” Rubio told reporters at the Christian Science Monitor breakfast in Washington Thursday. “I had a choice to make, and I chose my kids. And that’s what the book talks about and I guess when you make those choices, then whatever the consequences are. But I know that 30 years from now, no one will ever remember that report, but my kids will remember that I was home on Saturday.”
RUBIO CALLS ON HOLDER TO RESIGN: Rubio became the second senator to call on Attorney General Holder to resign. “Yes, I do at this point, I do,” Rubio answered when asked at The Christian Science Monitor breakfast in Washington Thursday if the attorney general should step down. “I think we’ve now reached a point of no return on this issue.”
JEB BUSH’S PRAISE FOR ROMNEY, ‘COMMON GROUND’ WITH OBAMA’: Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush spoke in English and Spanish to a crowd at the National Association of Latino Elected Officials in Orlando Thursday, offering praise for Romney ‘s earlier speech and citing the “common ground” he has with President Obama,” ABC News’ Shushannah Walshe reported. “Mitt Romney may have encountered a tough crowd addressing a group of Latinos Thursday, but former Florida Governor Jeb Bush transitioned easily from Spanish to English and drew loud applause on the issue of education reform and school choice – and complimented the presumptive Republican nominee’s rival, President Obama,” Walshe wrote. “At the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials or NALEO in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., Bush began by giving Romney a nod. ‘We heard an excellent speech, I thought, from Mitt Romney, who is a supporter of education reform and of school choice,’ Bush said. However, in his next breath he aligned himself with Romney’s rival and repeated what has gained him headlines over the last few weeks, but he deeply believes in: Working across party lines works as well as having a more open debate. ‘I am proud of the fact that as a former governor I was asked by [Education] Secretary [Arne] Duncan to introduce our current president of the United States in a high school in Miami because we share common ground,” Bush said to cheers from the crowd. “And I don’t know about you, but when we find common ground we shouldn’t fight anymore, we should move on and build on that success. Apparently one can get in trouble when they say these kinds of things, but I happen to believe it’s the American way. There is enough to fight about … to me it’s important that we begin to focus on how do we build capacity for the next generation to maintain the greatness of our country.’ ”
RUBIO ADDRESSES THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF ELECTED OFFICIALS TODAY
THE VP GUESSING GAME: Real Clear Politics looks at the history of vice presidential picks and how if history repeats itself, the guesses we’re making today about Romney’s running mate will turn out to be wrong. “While every eventual GOP nominee in the past five nonincumbent presidential cycles began the race as a favorite, the same cannot be said of their VP picks, all of whom were initially regarded inside the Beltway echo chamber either as blips on the political radar or not on the screen at all,” Scott Conroy wrote.
IT’S OFFICIAL: DANIELS OUT OF POLITICS: Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels was officially appointed head of Purdue University in Indiana Thursday, and the Indianapolis Star reported that there’s one thing he’s completely ready to shed: his life in politics. “There is one other change that impacts Daniels and Republicans more than Boilermakers: He’s bowing out of partisan political activity,” The Indianapolis Star reported. “He’ll do one final event — a fundraising event Monday in Wisconsin for former Gov. Tommy Thompson, who is running for the U.S. Senate. But he said he’ll do no other fundraising, no speaking at campaign events or commercials and will skip the Republican National Convention this summer. It’s a huge change for a man who a year ago was being pressured to run for the presidency himself.”
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