Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer, a moderate Democrat, says that likely Republican nominee Mitt Romney may have trouble in the general election because his father was “born on a polygamy commune in Mexico,” the Daily Beast reports.
Schweitzer told the news site that it would be a “tall order to position Hispanics to vote for” Romney, which he said was “kinda ironic” considering “his family came from a polygamy commune in Mexico.” However, Schweitzer continued, Romney is unlikely to “talk about his family coming from a polygamy commune in Mexico” because women are “not great fans of polygamy, 86 percent were not great fans of polygamy.”
“I am not alleging by any stretch that Romney is a polygamist and approves of [the] polygamy lifestyle, but his father was born into [a] polygamy commune in Mexico,” he continued.
Romney’s father, the late George Romney, was born in Mexico at a settlement founded by Mormons who had fled the United States’ anti-polygamy laws. He went on to become the CEO of the American Motor Company, a popular Governor of Michigan and the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development under President Richard Nixon.
George Romney’s parents were in a monogamous marriage and moved back to the United States when he was still a child. The Romney campaign did not comment on Schweitzer’s remarks, which were promptly condemned by President Obama’s re-election team.
“Attacking a candidate’s religion is out of bounds, and our campaign will not engage in it, and we don’t think others should either,” campaign spokesperson Lis Smith told the news site.
