On Friday morning’s “Fox & Friends,” Wisconsin Republican Rep. Paul Ryan, as expected, officially endorsed former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.
“Here is the point, we vote on Tuesday here in Wisconsin,” Ryan said. “Lots of my friends, family and supporters are asking me, you know who do we think we should vote for? I have two criteria I’m using to make my decision to vote on primary Tuesday. Who is the best person to be president, who will make the best president and who has the best chance of defeating Barack Obama? And in my opinion, Mitt Romney is clearly that person.”
Ryan explained his criteria for coming to that decision and said the focus was primarily to defeat President Barack Obama.
“I spent a good deal of time with Mitt Romney and his staff recently going through our country’s fiscal situation, talk being what it will take to get the country back on track and I am convinced Mitt Romney has the skills, the tenacity, principles, the courage and the integrity to do what it takes to get America back on track,” he said.
“So, I believe that he’s the right person for the job and I think this primary has been productive. I think it’s been constructive up until now. I think it’s made the candidates better. But I think we’re entering a phase where it’s counterproductive if this drags on much longer. So that’s why I think we need to coalesce as conservatives around Mitt Romney and focus on the big task at hand, which is defeating Barack Obama in the fall.”
Ryan said he was planning on putting a call in to Romney’s principal competitor, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, to explain his decision.
This is the third high-profile endorsement Romney has received in recent days. On Wednesday, Romney got the nod from Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio and yesterday secured the endorsement of former President George H.W. Bush.
