Mitt Romney’s top political adviser says he has talked about the possibility of a brokered convention with the 2012 presidential contender — but not in the way one might think.
Stuart Stevens explained the context of his brokered convention conversation with Romney during an interview on Hugh Hewitt show Wednesday, guest-hosted by this writer.
“We have talked about that, but not about some scenario where he would pop out of a hat,” Stevens said when asked whether he has heard the words “brokered convention” cross Romney’s lips.
Some on the right have speculated about the possibility of Romney re-emerging as a contender at the Republican National Convention if no current 2016 Republican candidate is able to win enough delegates to win the nomination on the first ballot.
“We have just talked about it in a sense these numbers are more inclined to indicate that you could have a brokered convention this cycle more so than we’ve seen since ’76, the last one we had,” Stevens explained. “I tend to think it is not going to happen because it doesn’t happen very often, but that’s probably not a very good reason. If you have one candidate who wins each of the first four primaries, that is a real ‘Hunger Games’ scenario, where no one emerges as dominant and this thing could drag on and no one could get to the delegates number you need to win.”
Stevens also relayed that while Romney thinks some of Donald Trump’s views are “crazy,” he believes Trump “is drawing a lot of people to the process and that’s a good thing.”
“I think that he thinks Trump isn’t going to win,” Stevens went on, explaining Romney’s views of the 2016 front-runner. “And I think some of his views, like what he recently said about Syria that, you know, that we should get out and let ISIS win and take care of [Syrian dictator Bashar al] Assad – he thinks it’s insane or crazy.”
Asked whether Romney regrets not entering the race earlier this year when he looked into the possibility and decided against it, Stevens said, “Romney is, I think, the most positive person I know.”
“He just doesn’t look back,” he added of Romney.
Listen to Stevens’ full interview on the “Hugh Hewitt Show,” beginning with his discussion of his new new book, “The Last Season: A Father, a Son, and a Lifetime of College Football.”