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| Following in a Father’s Footsteps, But Probably Not Into Politics | |
| (about 5 hours later) | |
| CAMBRIDGE, Ohio — When Tagg Romney, the eldest of Mitt and Ann Romney’s five sons, was a newly married student at Brigham Young University, he and his wife lived in a tiny basement apartment — the same one where his newlywed parents lived two decades earlier, when he was an infant. | |
| When Mr. Romney went on a Mormon mission, he wound up in France, just as his father had. When he decided to go to business school, he settled on Harvard, same as his dad. When he and his wife, Jennifer, bought a house, they picked one in Belmont, Mass., down the street from his parents. | When Mr. Romney went on a Mormon mission, he wound up in France, just as his father had. When he decided to go to business school, he settled on Harvard, same as his dad. When he and his wife, Jennifer, bought a house, they picked one in Belmont, Mass., down the street from his parents. |
| And when Tagg Romney went into business on his own — with his father’s finance chairman as a partner and $10 million in seed money from his family — he entered the same field, private equity, that made Mitt Romney a very wealthy man. | |
| In the tight-knit Romney clan, values and life choices are passed from generation to generation the way some families pass down heirloom silver. Yet the younger Mr. Romney, 42, insists he is not reliving his father’s life. | In the tight-knit Romney clan, values and life choices are passed from generation to generation the way some families pass down heirloom silver. Yet the younger Mr. Romney, 42, insists he is not reliving his father’s life. |
| After raising money and working as a surrogate for his father, he says he has no interest in working in a Romney administration — “I will be running my business from Boston” — and no intention of carrying on the political tradition that began with his grandfather, George. His wife, Jennifer, has little appetite for politics, and even relatives say Tagg is not the most natural politician in the family. (That distinction goes to Josh, the middle son.) | After raising money and working as a surrogate for his father, he says he has no interest in working in a Romney administration — “I will be running my business from Boston” — and no intention of carrying on the political tradition that began with his grandfather, George. His wife, Jennifer, has little appetite for politics, and even relatives say Tagg is not the most natural politician in the family. (That distinction goes to Josh, the middle son.) |
| “I don’t want to say I’d absolutely never run,” Mr. Romney said in an interview during a campaign trip last week in Ohio, “but I’d be really surprised if I did. It’s a really horrible process, and honestly I just don’t want to go through it, and I don’t want to put my family through it.” | |
| For now, though, he is all in, on the road six days out of seven, selling Mitt Romney, the Republican nominee, to the American public. “It means a lot to him, more than anything else, what people think about his father, do they know he’s a man of character and integrity,” said one friend, Kirk Jowers. “Tagg will do anything his father needs and anything he thinks will advance or protect his dad.” | For now, though, he is all in, on the road six days out of seven, selling Mitt Romney, the Republican nominee, to the American public. “It means a lot to him, more than anything else, what people think about his father, do they know he’s a man of character and integrity,” said one friend, Kirk Jowers. “Tagg will do anything his father needs and anything he thinks will advance or protect his dad.” |
| Here in the small city of Cambridge, several dozen Romney supporters were gathered in front of the local Republican headquarters, where a sign in the window proclaimed “Coal Country for Romney.” The campaign bus pulled up, and the younger Mr. Romney emerged with the local Congressional candidate in an effort to encourage early voting in this critical swing state. | |
| “He’ll make a great president for two reasons,” Mr. Romney told the crowd, speaking of his father. “The first is, he’s really good at what he does, he’s smart, he knows how to get things done.” And second, Tagg Romney said, is that Mitt Romney is “a really good man.” | “He’ll make a great president for two reasons,” Mr. Romney told the crowd, speaking of his father. “The first is, he’s really good at what he does, he’s smart, he knows how to get things done.” And second, Tagg Romney said, is that Mitt Romney is “a really good man.” |
| Like another son of a presidential candidate (think George W. Bush) the younger Mr. Romney occupies a unique niche in Romneyland. After working in 2002 as the campaign manager for Kerry Healey, his father’s lieutenant governor pick, and in 2007 and 2008 as a full-time campaign aide for his father, he has the trust of campaign advisers and the power to act as a liaison between them and the Romney family. Only this time, he has used it sparingly — in part because his father’s strategists ignored his early advice. | |
| Tagg Romney made a case more than a year ago that the campaign should let Americans get to know his father on a more personal level, according to one person involved in the campaign, who spoke anonymously to discuss internal deliberations. Top Romney strategists disagreed, instead emphasizing the candidate’s selling points as an economic leader. The younger Mr. Romney quit attending strategy sessions and settled into the role of surrogate and fund-raiser. | Tagg Romney made a case more than a year ago that the campaign should let Americans get to know his father on a more personal level, according to one person involved in the campaign, who spoke anonymously to discuss internal deliberations. Top Romney strategists disagreed, instead emphasizing the candidate’s selling points as an economic leader. The younger Mr. Romney quit attending strategy sessions and settled into the role of surrogate and fund-raiser. |
| “Tagg is not a Bobby Kennedy or even a George W. Bush figure running around telling people what his dad wants or doesn’t want,” said Robert O’Brien, a close friend of Tagg Romney and a foreign policy adviser to the campaign. “His role is to go out — and this is how Tagg views his role — and tell people about his dad’s character and what his dad has done throughout his life and why he believes that his dad is uniquely suited to turn the country around.” | “Tagg is not a Bobby Kennedy or even a George W. Bush figure running around telling people what his dad wants or doesn’t want,” said Robert O’Brien, a close friend of Tagg Romney and a foreign policy adviser to the campaign. “His role is to go out — and this is how Tagg views his role — and tell people about his dad’s character and what his dad has done throughout his life and why he believes that his dad is uniquely suited to turn the country around.” |
| Yet in recent weeks, the campaign has embraced Mr. Romney’s view that his father needed a more personal connection with voters, and its “Let Mitt be Mitt” strategy appears, along with his debate performances, to be helping the cause. Mr. Romney is now running neck and neck in the polls with President Obama, and closing the gap in several swing states. | Yet in recent weeks, the campaign has embraced Mr. Romney’s view that his father needed a more personal connection with voters, and its “Let Mitt be Mitt” strategy appears, along with his debate performances, to be helping the cause. Mr. Romney is now running neck and neck in the polls with President Obama, and closing the gap in several swing states. |
| Tagg Romney insists he played no role in the shift, but campaign insiders say he has more influence than he lets on. “Tagg definitely played a role in talking to people about it,” one top adviser said. Another said the younger Mr. Romney has been pushing the campaign’s communications shop for more openness and outreach to reporters. | Tagg Romney insists he played no role in the shift, but campaign insiders say he has more influence than he lets on. “Tagg definitely played a role in talking to people about it,” one top adviser said. Another said the younger Mr. Romney has been pushing the campaign’s communications shop for more openness and outreach to reporters. |
| Friends say Mr. Romney — who made headlines last week by saying he felt like “taking a swing” at Mr. Obama — does not live and breathe politics. He is much more interested in sports (he is a die-hard Boston Red Sox fan) and business. When his father first contemplated running for president, a friend gave Tagg two books — Richard Ben Cramer’s “What It Takes,” and Theodore H. White’s “The Making of the President 1960” — so he could educate himself on presidential politics. | |
| Just as Mitt Romney idolized his father, George, Tagg Romney openly admires Mitt Romney, which is why, in 2007, he quit his dream job as the Los Angeles Dodgers’ marketing director to move back to Boston as a strategist on his father’s first presidential campaign. (He says he had an “overwhelming feeling” that he “had to go back and help.”) And it is why he is jumped in again this time. | |
| One recent duty has been to relax his father on debate days. Before each face-off with Mr. Obama, he and his brothers would show up with their families to distract the candidate. | One recent duty has been to relax his father on debate days. Before each face-off with Mr. Obama, he and his brothers would show up with their families to distract the candidate. |
| “We talk sports, we watch funny YouTube clips, ‘Saturday Night Live’ clips,” said Mr. Romney, who is a father of six children, including 5-month-old twins. | “We talk sports, we watch funny YouTube clips, ‘Saturday Night Live’ clips,” said Mr. Romney, who is a father of six children, including 5-month-old twins. |
| Tagg Romney’s friends say that despite the parallels with his father, his personality is more like that of his mother, who can be more emotional. Of the five brothers, Tagg was the softhearted son, family members say, the one who got pummeled by a schoolyard bully after saying that he did not swear because he was Mormon. When he was a missionary, his friends poked fun at him for tearing up at sad stories. | |
| But politics has also thickened his skin. The 2012 race has brought unflattering coverage of his firm, Solamere Capital, which got started with investments from some Romney donors, as well as $10 million from Ann Romney’s blind trust. Asked about a recent article in The New Republic that suggested that Tagg Romney could not have succeeded without his last name, he responded forcefully. | |
| “I am sure it does not hurt that Mitt Romney is my dad,” he said. “I’m sure it’s opened a lot of doors for me. But I think I’ve been pretty effective once I’ve gotten through the door at doing a pretty good job.” | “I am sure it does not hurt that Mitt Romney is my dad,” he said. “I’m sure it’s opened a lot of doors for me. But I think I’ve been pretty effective once I’ve gotten through the door at doing a pretty good job.” |
| Those who know him say he is sincere when he says he intends to go back to his business in Boston. But they also say that if his father won the presidency and asked him to move to Washington, he would. Senior Romney advisers are barred from speculating on what a Romney administration might look like. | |
| But, one said of Tagg: “If his father said to him — if the president said to him — here’s a role I think you can uniquely play, would he do it? Absolutely.” | But, one said of Tagg: “If his father said to him — if the president said to him — here’s a role I think you can uniquely play, would he do it? Absolutely.” |