GOP Tries to Return Romney's 'Gift' Comment

It looks like Mitt Romney's parting shot—attributing Barack Obama's win to the "gifts" he offered minorities and the young—is the gift that keeps on giving for Democrats, as Republicans around the country hurried to distance themselves from their former nominee's comment. Prominent GOP governors attending yesterday's Republican Governors Association were lining up to repudiate the line, using much stronger language than they did after Romney's famous "47%" video during the campaign, notes Politico. Among the more recent reactions, from the GOP and the media:

• "It's wrong, it's not true," said Florida Gov. Rick Scott. "What we've got to do is say we want every vote, we want to take care of every citizen in our state."
• "What the voters are looking for us to do is to accept their votes and go forward," said Sen. Kelly Ayotte. "I don't know the full context of [Romney's comments] but I don’t agree with them."
• "I guess my feeling is that we need to turn the page, and we need to focus on the future and not make excuses for the past," said Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad.
• "The prevailing opinion among ... the professional political ranks of the Republican party ... is that there is much work to be done and that Romney will have a hand in almost none of it. Put more simply: Thanks for playing. Now go away," writes Chris Cillizza for the Washington Post.
• "It’s not too much to say that Romney is now uniting the country across party lines," writes Josh Marshall for TPM. But what they're in agreement about is "that he’s someone who should leave as soon as possible and not say anything publicly again. Actually scratch that. Democrats are starting to think that having Romney around and continuing to dump on a broad range of Americans might be pretty awesome."

(More Mitt Romney stories.)