Newt Gingrich Calls Mitt Romney’s ‘Gift’ Comments ‘Insulting’
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Jessica McGowan/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) — Former Republican presidential contender Newt Gingrich has joined a growing number of Republicans in criticizing Mitt Romney for saying he lost the election because President Obama gave “gifts” to minorities such as African-Americans and Latinos.
“I just think it’s nuts,” Gingrich told Martha Raddatz Sunday on ABC’s This Week. “I mean, first of all, it’s insulting.”
“This would be like Wal-Mart having a bad week and going, ‘The customers have really been unruly,'” he continued. “I mean, the job of a political leader in part is to understand the people. If we can’t offer a better future that is believable to more people, we’re not going to win.”
It’s not the first time Gingrich, the former House Speaker, has expressed his displeasure with Romney’s remarks. He told NBC’s Today show earlier that Republicans “owe [Obama] the respect of trying to understand what they did and how they did it.”
He added that he would have been “dumfounded” before the election at the idea of Romney getting fewer votes than John McCain.
Gingrich also slammed Romney during an interview with KLRU-TV in Austin, Texas.
“I’m very disappointed with Governor Romney’s analysis, which I believe is insulting and profoundly wrong,” he said. “First of all, we didn’t lose Asian-Americans because they got any gifts. He did worse with Asian-Americans than he did with Latinos. This is the hardest-working and most successful ethnic group in America, okay, they ain’t into gifts.”
“If it had been that simple, my question would be, ‘Why didn’t you outbid him?’ He had enough billionaire supporters, if buying the electorate was the key, he could have got all his super PAC friends together and said, don’t buy ads, give gifts,” Gingrich continued. “Be like the northwest Indians who have gift-giving ceremonies….Go town-by-town and say, ‘Come here, let me give you gifts. Here are Republican gifts.’ They could have an elephant coming in with gifts on it.”
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