Mitt Romney will not attend this summer’s Republican National Convention, during which Donald Trump will receive the party’s nomination. The move underscores the party’s deep divide and ruling out any final possibility that the 2012 Republican nominee will ride into the convention as a “white knight” candidate.
“Gov. Romney has no plans to attend the convention,” a Romney aide told the Washington Post on Thursday.
Since the early days of Trump’s candidacy, Romney has opposed Trump at every turn, and even delivered a speech in March aimed entirely at criticizing Trump and encouraging him to drop out of the race.
Before Trump was declared the presumptive nominee on Tuesday night and members of the GOP looked for alternative candidates to rise up at the July convention, the former Massachusetts governor’s name was thrown into the mix multiple times. But, since Romney will not attend, there is no longer a chance he will swoop in, as many had hoped.
When Romney ran for president in 2012, Trump endorsed him and helped raise money for the campaign. But during his 2016 run for office, Trump has often criticized Romney’s campaign.
“I don’t care,” Trump said of Romney’s attendance at the convention during an interview last month. “He can be there if he wants.”
Romney’s announcement comes within 24 hours of both former Presidents George H.W Bush and George W. Bush announcing they will not endorse the Republican nominee this year. John McCain, the 2008 nominee, said he also plans to skip this year’s GOP convention.
