Mitt Romney in State of Florida Archives

On Budget & Economy: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were source of housing bubble

ROMNEY: Well, I think you know that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were a big part of why we have the housing crisis in the nation that we have. Speaker Gingrich was hired by Freddie Mac to promote them, to influence other people throughout Washington, encouraging them not to dismantle these two entities. I think that was an enormous mistake. I think, instead, we should have had a whistle-blower and not horn-tooter. He should have stood up and said, look, these things are a disaster; this is a crisis. He should have been anxiously telling the American people that these entities were causing a housing bubble that would cause a collapse that we've seen around the country. And are they a problem today? Absolutely. They're offering mortgages, again to people who can't possibly repay them. We're creating another housing bubble, which will hurt the American people.

On Foreign Policy: Critical time for American century vs. European socialism

Our economy is becoming weaker. The foundation of our future economy is being eroded. Government has become too large. We're headed in a very dangerous direction.

I believe, to get America back on track, we're going to have to have dramatic, fundamental, extraordinary change in Washington to be able to allow our private sector to once again reemerge competitively, to scale back the size of government and to maintain our strength abroad in our military capacities. I believe that, to change Washington in such a dramatic way, you cannot do it by people who have been there their entire careers.

On Immigration: Enforce employment laws; illegal immigrants will self-deport

GINGRICH: I actually agree that self-deportation will occur if you're single. I would just suggest that grandmothers or grandfathers aren't likely to self-deport.

ROMNEY: Those who come into the country legally would be given an identification card, and if employers hire someone without a card, then those employers would be severely sanctioned. If you do that, people who have come here illegally won't be able to find work. And over time, those people would tend to leave the country, or self-deport. I don't think anyone is interested in going around and rounding up people around the country and deporting 11 million illegal immigrants into America. Let's focus our attention on how to make legal immigration work and stop illegal immigration.

On Immigration: English should be the official language of the US

ROMNEY: [to Gingrich]: Did you say that?

GINGRICH: No. What I said was, we want everybody to learn English. I didn't use the word "Spanish." We do not want anyone trapped in a situation where they cannot get a job, they cannot rise. And that's why I think English should be the official language of government, and that's why I think every young American should learn English.

ROMNEY: I think our position on English in our schools and in our nation is the same, which I believe English should be the official language of the United States. I also believe that in our schools, we should teach kids in English. I fought for a program to have English immersion in our schools so our kids could learn in English. I think we agree on this: Kids in this country should learn English so they can have all the jobs and all the opportunity of people who are here.

On Technology: Focus manned space program on commercial products

ROMNEY: That's an enormous expense. And right now I want to be spending money here. Of course the Florida space coast has been badly hurt and I believe in a very vibrant and strong space program. I'd like to bring in the top professors that relate to space areas and physics, the top people from industry, because I want to make sure what we're doing in space translates into commercial products. I want to bring in our top military experts on space needs. And I'd like to come together and talk about different options and the cost. I'd like corporate America as well as the defense network and others that could come together in a partnership basis to create a plan that will keep our space program thriving and growing. I'm not looking for a colony on the moon. I'd rather be rebuilding housing here in the US.

On Budget & Economy: Make sure that we rein in spending

On Budget & Economy: Support some kind of national catastrophic fund

On Corporations: Key to economic stimulus: get companies to buy more stuff

A: Well, there’s a great deal that is effective in his plan. First, he’s getting money back to consumers. That makes sense to me I just think we need to go further. We go to corporate support and helping corporations have the incentive to buy more capital equipment. That he also does. I do it more aggressively by writing off a larger amount of capital expenditures--getting companies to buy more stuff so that other companies will hire people. If you want to turn an economy around, the key thing is to grow jobs. It’s not just to get checks in the hands of consumers; it’s consumers & companies buying things that create jobs.

On Government Reform: Use my own money in a campaign to try and change the US

On Government Reform: Not concerned about voters on his campaign self-contribution

A: I’m not concerned about the voters. I’m much more concerned about the other guys on this stage. It’s competitive information we make sure that we use for our own benefit. I made a substantial contribution. I can’t imagine having gone to my friends and asked them to do what they’ve done, going out and raising money in my behalf, without saying I’m going to put some of my contributions behind this effort as well, because frankly, it’s important. Given the contributions I made in this race, I know I owe no one anything. I don’t have some group there that I have a special obligation to that raised money for me. I’m by far the biggest contributor to my own campaign. People can count on the fact that there’s no nobody that can call me and say, “Hey, look, you owe me,” because they don’t.

On Gun Control: Support the 2nd Amendment AND the assault weapon ban

On Health Care: Get everyone some form of catastrophic health coverage

On Homeland Security: Add 100,000 to the military without a draft

A: I’m recommending that we add 100,000 active-duty personnel to our military. We’re right now at about 1.5 million. Take that up to about 1.6 million. We found in our state that we were losing enrollees for the National Guard at about 6% per year. And the legislature and I got together and passed something called the Welcome Home Bill. We said if you’ll sign up for the National Guard, we’ll pay for your entire education for four years. We put in some other benefits as well--life insurance and other features that we decided to pay for. The result of that was, the next year enrollments went up 30%. So if we want more people to sign up for the military, we have to improve the deal. Our GI Bill has gotten a little old. We need to update our funding level for that, so that young people who go into the military get a full ride as they come home and get to go into college.

On Principles & Values: Don’t think religion figuring into this race

I don’t think you’re going to see religion figuring into this race after people have had a chance to get to know all the candidates.

On Social Security: Will try to fix Social Security without raising taxes

A: I’m not going to raise taxes. Not only are you taking money away from their pocketbooks, you’re also slowing down the economy. You slow down the economy, more people lose work. More people lose work, of course, you’re having a lot of folks that really have their lives turned upside down. So, raising taxes is just something you don’t want to do. We’re going to have to sit down with the Democrats and say, let’s have a compromise on these three elements that could get us to bring Social Security into economic balance. You can have personal accounts where people can invest in something that does better than government bonds--with some portion of their Social Security. We’re going to have the initial benefit calculations for wealthier Americans calculated based on the Consumer Price Index rather than the wage index. That saves almost two-thirds of the shortfall. You can change the retirement age. You can push it out a little bit.

On Tax Reform: I support the Bush tax cuts

On War & Peace: It was the right decision to go into Iraq

On Abortion: Would be delighted to sign federal ban on all abortions

A: Let me say it. I’d be delighted to sign that bill. But that’s not where we are. That’s not where America is today. Where America is, is ready to overturn Roe v. Wade and return to the states that authority. But if the Congress got there, we had that kind of consensus in that country, terrific.

On Budget & Economy: Fundamentally change how Washington works, to reduce pork

A: Every bill that comes forward that’s got pork in it and earmarks that are unnecessary, we’ve got to veto them and send them back. But it’s got to be broader than that. We’re going to have to see fundamental changes in the way Washington works. We’re just not going to get out-of-the-box thinking with inside-the-Beltway politics.

On Crime: To reduce black on black crime, get more moms and dads

A: Number one is to get more moms and dads. Number two, we’ve got to have better education in our schools. And number three, we have to do a better job with our policing. And I was very proud that I added one state police class after another.

On Homeland Security: Not wise for us to describe our interrogation techniques

A: I do not believe that as a presidential candidate, it is wise for us to describe precisely what techniques we will use in interrogating people. I want to make sure these folks are kept at Guantanamo. I don’t want the people that are carrying out attacks on this country to be brought into our jail system and be given legal representation in this country. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed went to Guantanamo and he met G.I.s and CIA interrogators. And that’s just exactly how it ought to be.

On Immigration: Illegal immigrants shouldn’t get tuition break in schools

A: Let me tell you what I did as governor. I said no to driver’s licenses for illegals. I said, number two, we’re going to make sure that those that come here don’t get a tuition break in our schools, which I disagree with other folks on that one. Number three, I applied to have our state police enforce the immigration laws in May, seven months before I was out of office.

On Principles & Values: Bible is the word of God; I don’t disagree with Bible

A: I believe the Bible is the word of God, absolutely. I might interpret the word differently than you interpret the word, but I read the Bible and I believe the Bible is the word of God. I don’t disagree with the Bible. I try to live by it.

On Civil Rights: MA Constitution, by John Adams, has no same-sex marriage

The status of marriage, if it’s allowed among the same sex individuals in one state is going to spread to the entire nation. And that’s why it’s important to have a national standard for marriage. And I’m committed to making sure that we reinforce the institution of marriage in this country by insisting that all states have a right to have marriage as defined as between a man and a woman; and we don’t have unelected judges saying we’re going to impose same-sex marriage where it was clearly not in their state constitution.

My state’s constitution was written by John Adams. It isn’t there. I’ve looked. The people need to speak on this issue and make sure that marriage is preserved as between a man and a woman.

On Health Care: Let states create their own private, market-based insurance

ROMNEY: First of all, I’m not going to give the Democratic legislature credit for the plan that I helped build. I think it’s a model that other states can adopt in some respects. But our plan is different than Hillary Clinton’s in a lot of important ways. For Democrats, they want to have government take it over. The right answer is to get all of our citizens insured so they don’t have to worry about losing their insurance if they change jobs or have a preexisting condition. But Hillary says the federal government’s going to tell you what kind of insurance, and it’s all government insurance. And I say no, let the states create their own plans, and instead of government insurance, [have] private, market-based insurance. Hillary’s plan costs an extra $110 billion. My plan doesn’t cost any additional money.

On Health Care: Removing most mandates drove down premium cost by half

ROMNEY: We took as many mandates out as we could in our policies. And the legislature kept some there. I tried to take them all out; they put some back in. It was a compromise. They put some mandates there. But, let me tell you how many we got out. The price of the premium for an individual, 42 years old, in Boston, used to $350 a month. Now, it’s $180. We basically cut it in half by deregulating. Congressman, you’re absolutely right that taking regulation out of insurance brings the price down, and that’s why my plan would go state by state, deregulate them so we can get the cost of premiums down. We got the job done.

On Homeland Security: Lawyers are the last people to ask about war decisions

MCCAIN: Because I don’t think that’s the time to call in the lawyers, when we’re in a national security crisis. Those are the last people I’d call in. I’d call in my wisdom, my knowledge, my background, my experience, and my ability to lead this nation.

ROMNEY: I want to make one thing very, very clear, and that is if there were ever a question of a security threat to this country, I would act immediately to protect the interests of America and our citizens. No question about that. But every president has of course met with White House counsel and they have written opinions about the involvement of Congress. The decision to take our men and women to war is the most grave decision and I would do that on a very deliberate and careful basis, not a half-cocked basis.

On Principles & Values: Acting like Hillary won’t keep Hillary out of White House

ROMNEY: This is a critical time for our nation and for our party. We’re going to have to bring together the same coalition that Ronald Reagan put together; conservatives fiscally, conservatives from a military standpoint and conservatives socially. Because we’re not going to keep Hillary Clinton out of the White House by acting like Hillary Clinton. Now, I’m proud of my record. Not just of the words, but of the record of the governor of Massachusetts.

THOMPSON: I was conservative as soon as I put down Conscience of a Conservative when I was in the college. In 8 years in the US Senate, I fought for tax cuts, a balanced budget, and welfare reform, all of which we achieved. All that time, I compiled a 100 percent pro-life voting record.

On Principles & Values: Proud of his accomplishments in fighting the Liberal Lion

ROMNEY: When I ran against Ted Kennedy in 1994, that was a big uphill climb. But let me tell you, I was fighting for issues like making sure that we would have the death penalty in our state, fighting to keep our taxes down. I was fighting against the Liberal Lion in perhaps the toughest state in America. And I’m pretty proud of what I was able to accomplish in that race, but nothing compares to the pride I have with the work that I was able to do as a governor.

McCAIN: Gov. Romney, you’ve been spending the last year trying to fool people about your record. I don’t want you to start fooling them about mine. I stand on my record as a conservative, and I don’t think you can fool the American people. They may not agree with me on a couple of issues, but they’ll know I’m telling the truth, and my steadfast positions on these issues for more than 20 years.

On Social Security: Private accounts work better than extending retirement age

1. The one Democrats want: raise taxes. It’s the wrong way to go.
2. The president said let’s have private accounts and take that surplus money that’s being gathered now in Social Security and put that into private accounts. That works.
3. Other people said, well, extend the retirement age. That mathematically works. It’s not as attractive.
4. And the last is to index the Social Security benefits, the first benefit, to something other than wages, which is what it has always been. But, in my view, that’s the wrong way to go, other than for higher-income Americans. Let’s consider indexing based on prices rather than wages.