Years of campaigning shape, sharpen Romney

TAMPA – On Tuesday, Mitt Romney will finally and officially get what he has been pursuing for years: his shot at the White House.

  • Mitt Romney attends a campaign rally in Powell, Ohio, on Saturday.

    By Jack Gruber, USA TODAY

    Mitt Romney attends a campaign rally in Powell, Ohio, on Saturday.

By Jack Gruber, USA TODAY

Mitt Romney attends a campaign rally in Powell, Ohio, on Saturday.

Through six years of campaigning, more than a dozen Republican opponents and hundreds of millions of dollars spent, Romney has become more comfortable as a candidate, and his party appears to have become increasingly comfortable with him as their nominee.

Romney advisers, close friends and Republican leaders alike say the lessons he learned along his long road to the nomination have not only sharpened his skills but also crafted a campaign that reflects who he is.

"He is very happy that he has the opportunity to address the issues that he never got a chance to address in 2008," said Beth Myers, a longtime Romney aide who led his vice presidential search. "He's getting that opportunity now. It's his agenda, he gets to talk about what he wants to talk about. He gets to share his vision for America and, of course, he's very gratified."

"This campaign is just so much his creation and his design, it doesn't feel like he's reading somebody else's lines or playing somebody else's script," said adviser Tom Rath, a New Hampshire-based Republican consultant.

Romney's first bid for the White House ended in February 2008 after defeats in the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida primaries.

Myers said that from the beginning of the 2012 run, Romney was determined to remain focused on his message about jobs and the state of the economy and to not be distracted by "every shiny object" that appears during the race.

"He learned that that was just how you had to do it and was much more effective this go-around at communicating his vision than he had been four years ago," Myers said.

That strategy has been challenged constantly during the race, particularly during the GOP primaries where his conservative competitors challenged his views on volatile issues such as immigration, abortion and health care during the numerous Republican debates.

Although Romney's 19 debate appearances were a rough training ground at times, several of his advisers cited them as key moments in the race.

"At the debate in Michigan, he was giving an answer whether he had changed a position on this or that and just said, 'Look at my life. I'm a man of constancy,' " said Stuart Stevens, a senior adviser to the Romney campaign. "It was very powerful."

Romney supporter Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, said, "He didn't just win this nomination, he beat everyone else."

Throughout the tumultuous GOP contest, Romney watched the lead change nine times, according to Gallup, and spent $76.6 million vanquishing any opponent that remained ahead of him for too long.

"Primaries are always hard," Stevens said. "The super PACs made it harder this year because they kept other candidates alive. It's hard to run for president, and it should be; it's a difficult process."

Some on the conservative base remained skeptical - a fact that helped the primary drag on until April when former senator Rick Santorum dropped out.

Since Santorum's departure, the right has come to terms with Romney and this week most will rally around him in Tampa.

There are still skeptics.

Steve Deace, an Iowa-based conservative radio host, said the race is an "exact replay of 2008," aside from the fact that President Obama is weaker than he was as a candidate, giving Romney a better chance than Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.

"Really, the only change I've seen in the five years Romney has been running for president is that he reinvented himself yet again," Deace said. "He's run for office four times, and as a different candidate each time."

Former Mississippi governor Haley Barbour, who chose not to run for president and has been critical of Romney at times, said Romney had to overcome the ideological discomfort of the party's right wing.

"He sought the nomination as the least conservative candidate of the conservative party," Barbour said. "Romney is conservative, just not as conservative as (the other GOP contenders), so now that the party has embraced him … he is much more comfortable because he's not threatened by a challenge from the right."

He said Romney's choice of Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., as a running mate further solidified him with the party's base, because Ryan has strong conservative credentials.

Romney's pollster Neil Newhouse said Ryan's "energy, his enthusiasm, his campaigning style and skill is rubbing off" on the former Massachusetts governor.

"I see a better Mitt Romney," he said.

Republican pollster Kellyanne Conaway, who supported former House speaker Newt Gingrich during the primaries, agreed those contests were a crucial test for Romney, but his win showed the right was ready to accept him.

Conaway said that although Romney has been criticized for appearing too aloof, she has learned to see "humility where some people saw indifference."

"He is still uncomfortable talking about himself. It's sort of endearing," she said.

The effort to unite the party around Romney began years before the Republican primaries.

Rath, Romney's longtime New Hampshire-based consultant, said one of the problems with his first presidential campaign was that Romney never established a "political life" or the deep contacts within the political system that go with it, despite multiple statewide campaigns in Massachusetts and a term as governor.

"He has very carefully over the last four years been everywhere and done everything for candidates. There's been no race too small. And we've gone in and done it over and over and over again," Rath said. "Now, you could see it when people started to come online with endorsements this time, there was a real sense of, 'We know this guy.' "

He was a frequent presence on Capitol Hill in 2009 and 2010, appearing on Republican-led economic panels and fundraising for House and Senate candidates through his Free & Strong America political action committee.

The PAC donated $796,799 to federal candidates in 2010, up from $231,256 in 2008, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

The next three months will test the skills Romney has sharpened as he drives to broaden coalitions — this time reaching out to independents and former Obama voters — and endures another round of tough debates, trading negative jabs with President Obama's campaign.

"When you put yourself out to run for elected office, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Mitt's had a very successful career," Myers said. "He knows that when you strive for difficult goals, sometimes you make them, sometimes you don't. So — fear of failure? No."

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