Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, intensified his criticism of President Obama after Friday’s Islamic State attack in Paris.
In an interview with radio host Hugh Hewitt Tuesday, Romney criticized Obama for taking “no responsibility” for the terror group’s rise while “the world around us is going to hell,” adding further that Obama could go down as “one of the worst foreign policy presidents” in U.S. history.
“I find it troubling and revealing that the world around us is going to hell, and the president takes no responsibility,” Romney said. “He and Hillary Clinton don’t admit to making any mistake, and they tell us everything is under control. Frankly, they’re responsible for much of the mess we’re seeing in the world, and we’re looking for a different strategy — a different course.”
“I just think that on the issue of foreign policy and keeping America and America’s interests, and the interests of freedom secure and strong, this president’s been a disaster,” Romney said. “I think he may go down in history as one of the very worst foreign policy presidents in American history.”
“The consequence of this is loss of life. The consequence of this is the loss of freedom,” Romney said. “The consequence is an American that is not as strong to defend itself and to defend our values as it should be.”
The former Massachusetts governor also took on the issue of Syrian refugees, telling Hewitt that it’s “very difficult” for the State Department to vet them. Thus far, 27 states have said that they will refuse to take in any such refugees, while only seven have said they will welcome them.
“America has to be smart,” Romney said. “We have to recognize that it’s very difficult for us through an interview with a State Department bureaucrat to figure out if somebody is intent on bombing us or planning on attacking us in some way. What we’ve seen in France is evidence that these people intend to infiltrate various western nations and to wreak havoc.”
Romney’s remarks come a day after President Obama’s comments at Monday’s press conference at the G20 summit in Turkey, during which he said he’s “not interested” in going forth with a strategy to pursue “some notion of American leadership.” Romney called those remarks a “sad commentary.”
“What I’m not interested in doing is posing or pursuing some notion of American leadership, or America winning or whatever slogans they come up with, that has no relationship to what is actually going to work to protect the American people and to protect people in the region who are getting killed,” Obama said Monday. “I’m too busy for that.”
