Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) signaled that nearly any candidate in the 2024 field, of either party, would be an “upgrade” over another term for former President Trump.
“I’d be happy to support virtually any one of the Republicans — maybe not Vivek [Ramaswamy] — but the others that are running would be acceptable to me, and I’d be happy to vote for them,” the retiring senator said Friday in an interview with CBS’s Norah O’Donnell.
“I’d be happy to vote for a number of the Democrats too,” he continued. “It would be an upgrade, in my opinion, from Donald Trump and perhaps also from Joe Biden.”
Romney announced in September that he will not seek reelection, sparking a wave of gloating insults from Trump and his allies.
“Mitt Romney, sometimes referred to as Pierre Delecto, will not be seeking a second term in the U.S. Senate, where he did not serve with distinction,” Trump wrote in all caps on Truth Social when Romney announced his retirement, referencing the pseudonym Romney used for a private Twitter account.
Romney, 76, cited his age in his retirement message.
“Frankly, it’s time for a new generation of leaders,” he said. “They’re the ones that need to make the decisions that will shape the world they will be living in.”
The Utah senator has been one of Trump’s most vocal critics among Senate Republicans.
He voted to impeach Trump twice and has continuously marked the former president as a danger to the country.
The Utah Republican’s biographer, McKay Coppins, late last month suggested the animosity between the former president and senator is so heavy that he could even opt to endorse Biden later in the election.
“I would keep an eye out for whether Romney does something like endorse Joe Biden late in the election,” Coppins said in an October interview with “The Press Box” podcast. “I mean, I have no idea, I haven’t talked to him about this. I would not be shocked if he did.”