WASHINGTON – Former House speaker Newt Gingrich, on the eve of suspending his roller coaster presidential bid, said in an interview with USA TODAY that he will embrace Mitt Romney‘s candidacy Wednesday and is ready to campaign for his former rival.
The two men will make a joint appearance in a few weeks, when Gingrich will make an official endorsement. The Romney campaign and the Republican National Committee have offered to be helpful as Gingrich works to retire his campaign debt.
In a phone interview Tuesday, Gingrich said he had no regrets about his decision to run for president, but “I have regrets about not being smarter about how to run.”
He wished he had started out with a “bolder” campaign that eschewed consultants and focused on big ideas such as brain research and energy independence, he said. With “more discipline and more courage to be more outside the mainstream, it might have worked better.”
Still, he had only praise for the opponent he once derided as not conservative enough.
“Mitt Romney met the first criteria of being a good candidate: He won,” Gingrich said. “Now you have to respect that.” He added, “We sure didn’t give it to him. We did everything we could to slug it out with him, and he ended up being tough enough and being good enough at raising money” to prevail.
Read more at USA Today.
