Huckabee Mounts Counterattack Against Romney Over Paroled Rapist Story
Mike Huckabee is mounting a serious counter-attack against Mitt Romney's recent efforts to tar the Arkansas governor over the explosive story that he pushed for parole for a serial racist who later went on to commit murder.
In repeated appearances, Huckabee has pushed back against Romney's charge with a strategy that seems counterintuitive for a Republican primary: He's attacking Romney for not granting clemency, in a case where Romney denied the request of an Iraq War veteran over a juvenile incident involving a BB gun. Making this veteran even more sympathetic, he wanted Romney to grant the clemency so that he could be eligible to become a policeman.
Here's some video of him making this argument yesterday on Morning Joe:
More after the jump.
Huckabee told an Iowa crowd today about Romney's actions in the case, and then asked the audience if they would have granted the clemency. He received an overwhelmingly affirmative answer.
"My opponent said no," Huckabee said. "Now let me ask you, do you believe he acted in the best interest of that young man and his state, or did he act in the best interest of his own future political career? That’s judgment, folks, you’ve just decided whose judgment is better."
It's this sort of take — that he was acting compassionately and without any concern for political repercussions — that might help to endear Huckabee to some conservative voters, while also reminding them why they wouldn't trust Romney. It still doesn't get him completely out from under his actions in the Wayne Dumond case, but it might just be enough to distract people.
Comments (23)
Anonymous wrote on December 20, 2007 12:24 PM:Awesome. Good for Huckabee. Everyone in Massachusetts was so mad about this case that it's really great to see Romney having to defend his indefensible actions on a national stage, while fighting for his political life.
This will work b/c it is undeniably true. Everything Romney said or did as governor was with one eye on the presidency. He's sort of like the Hillary Clinton of the GOP race. He never exercised any independent judgment.
willyjsimmons wrote on December 20, 2007 12:31 PM:'He's sort of like the Hillary Clinton of the GOP race.'
Quoted for it's ridiculousness.
Huckabee comparing a murdering rapist to a wannabe policeman = FAIL.
Romney still sucks, but whatever.
Mark wrote on December 20, 2007 12:47 PM:This makes no sense to me. The guy who was not granted clemency was convicted of a minor gun crime by a jury of his peers. There was no foul play or illegal prosecutorial indiscretion. Should we make it a common practice to override jury decisions simply because it's the nice thing to do? I side with Romney that we should not override jury decisions because that places mistrust of our judicial system into the picture. But unless there is something illegal done during the prosecution that leads to putting someone in jail, then it is merited.
But I do feel the state should change its laws regarding that... given the circumstances, I feel the law enforcement agencies should allow him to be a policeman since the event involved a BB gun that didn't break the skin and he was just a young teenager. So, I feel it's the laws and the law enforcement agency that should change to allow him to serve on the force instead of having a Governor override jury decisions.
Mark wrote on December 20, 2007 12:49 PM:Oh... and Romney never brought up the Dumond case against Huckabee. He only talked about pardoning 1,033 people including 12 murderers. He never focused on the Dumond case as an attack against Huckabee. Huckabee denied there were 12 murderers that were pardoned but state records prove otherwise... not sure how he thinks he can get away with a bold-faced lie.
Dog tail ? wrote on December 20, 2007 1:02 PM: Does anyone have any information on the Huckabee dog story concerning his son and the humane society?
I thought that was Romney.
Lets see Romney didn't pardon a guy who shot someone with a bb gun and Huckabee pardoned a convicted rapist who within weeks of his release raped and murdered a woman....let me think which is worse.
Al beit maybe Romney should've pardoned the bb shouter, but there is no way in heck Huckabee should've pardoned a convicted rapist, what was he thinkging.....maybe if Bin Laden came and confessed his sins to Huck, he'd be forgive too and told to go on his merry way!
Clay wrote on December 20, 2007 1:21 PM:Personally, I admire Romney's stance on pardons and clemency; it takes a pretty arrogant man to think his judgement is better than that of the whole legal system.
Romney as President would be the first to tell you that the judicial system shouldn't "legislate from the bench." Rational people can see that, for consistency's sake, he should also rationally believe that the executive branch shouldn't try to take the place of lawyers, judge, and jury.
The role of pardons and clemency given to the executive branch of government is intended as one of oversight, part of checks and balances, not as a matter of "judgement" at all.
Do any of you really think Clinton showed good judgement with all of his eleventh hour pardons, or for that matter that Huckabee's record of over a thousand is evidence of good judgement?
Good judgement is to recognize what your role is as a government officer, and stay within that role, which is what Romney did as governor in refusing that pardon, even though it sounds like he was getting a lot of heat about it at the time.
I predict it will take the good voters of Iowa about 24 hours to figure that out. I can sense that Huck's 15 minutes are about up, can't you?
Paul S wrote on December 20, 2007 1:28 PM:Tragically, Dumond killed a woman in Missouri. Huckabee leads in Missouri and has recieved several key endorsements there. If the people of Missouri don't hold him accountable for the actions of Dumond, neither will the rest of the country.
Anonymous wrote on December 20, 2007 1:48 PM:The guy who was not granted clemency was convicted of a minor gun crime by a jury of his peers. There was no foul play or illegal prosecutorial indiscretion. Should we make it a common practice to override jury decisions simply because it's the nice thing to do? I side with Romney that we should not override jury decisions because that places mistrust of our judicial system into the picture.
FWIW, the MA guy was convicted as a juvenile, so there would have been no jury trial. It would have been a bench trial, with the expectation that as an adult his crime would be expunged from his record. And it was, for all intents and purposes, except when it came to passing the police background check.
So a pardon wouldn't have been overriding a jury verdict; it would have been giving executive clemency to someone who has paid for his crime, shown his rehabilitation, and now seeks to serve his community.
David Seaton's News Links wrote on December 20, 2007 2:06 PM:I'm about as far left as you can get without getting on some secret list (or maybe I am?) but I am convinced that Mike Huckabee is a political genius.
Howard Dean has often said the "values voter" should not be awarded to the Republicans by default. Democrats could learn a lot by studying Huckabee.
I have no idea what is really behind Mike Huckabee's friendly facade, but he is making some interesting and nuanced noises for a southern populist and I think Democrats should take note of these nuances and make some of the same noises.
What are the nuances I'm talking about? For one thing, as far as I know he never uses Reagan-type racist code terms like, "state's rights", which is code for keeping black people from voting, or "welfare queen", which another, racially loaded term. In fact I believe he is on record as saying that the major problem of the American prison system is that it is filled with people who are drug addicts, not criminals, and that instead of prison they should be in rehab. Since the majority of prisoners in American jails are persons of color, this statement is profoundly un-racist. And if you consider how much more caring, un-punitive and especially how much more expensive it would be to treat these unfortunates as sick people instead of criminals to be locked away, the statement is amazingly un-conservative. This is the sort of message that Democrats should be delivering.
Why are so many of the poor of America, white and black, socially conservative? Because without a welfare state, the only institutions that offer any comfort or protection are the church and the family. The family is the first welfare state. Here is Spain, where, I live, we have a welfare state and a fine public health system, the traditional family is still in place. In the hospital system this means that the operations are fantastic, but the nursing is deficient, because normally the patients are surrounded by solicitous family members carrying bed pans etc and nurses only come around if patient suddenly takes a turn for the worse. In the USA there is no welfare state and the family is also under heavy pressure from the system. The worst of both worlds for the poor, no welfare state and not much family or community either.
Poor people are terrified: frightened people take comfort where they can. A divorced waitress with two kids who has to take them to an emergency room to treat their asma can't be criticized for being a "Left Behind" enthusiast. There is no better country than America in the whole world to be rich. It is probably the only country in the world where the rich are loved. Conversely there is no worse country in the world to be poor. Of course these people are paranoid, the system literally hates them.
We all know that Marx said that religion was the "opium of the people", but it could be argued that worshiping Jesus is less harmful to poor people than taking meths, heroin or crack. Very few people are equipped to take such suffering straight.
Huckabee sometimes talks just like an old fashioned, Huey Long type southern populist. In an amazingly un-Reaganlike statement Huckabee demolished the central Republican article of faith, "trickle down economics", claiming that cutting the taxes of the super rich is: "a false and callous assumption that the poorest people in our nation, with inadequate salaries, lack of nutritious food, substandard housing and nonexistent or underfunded health care, can somehow afford to patiently wait while someone else's wealth eventually splashes onto them.". Hell, that sounds like that other creationist, the Democrat, William Jennings Bryan! No wonder the conservative establishment is horrified by him. Where are the Democrats on this, only Edward's make any of these noises.
If Democrats were intelligent and, after 2004, this is in doubt, they would study Huckabee with the attitude of humble self-criticism and then triangulate him to death. I really doubt that they can and they will.
It would be a shame if a serious populist movement took off in the United States and the party of FDR was left out of it... But I'm afraid that's what might happen.
David Seaton wrote on December 20, 2007 2:12 PM:Imagine a race between Edwards and Huckabee! Imagine the debates.
Orwell's Intuition wrote on December 20, 2007 2:14 PM:Paul S wrote on December 20, 2007 1:28 PM:
Tragically, Dumond killed a woman in Missouri. Huckabee leads in Missouri and has recieved several key endorsements there. If the people of Missouri don't hold him accountable for the actions of Dumond, neither will the rest of the country.
Well, Paul, you know Missouri is the Show Me State, which for many of its citizens translates as, "Show me a hypocritical freak, and I'll vote for him."
over there wrote on December 20, 2007 2:18 PM:Sometimes a truly horrible defense is worse than no defense. This idiot move of Huckabee's--probably the best he can come up with given the craven indefensibility of his actions in the Dumond case--simply highlights what his "compassion" caused: the needless brutal murder of one and perhaps two women. This is supposed to compare to some schmoe not getting to be a cop?
As for making clemency decisions that are purely politically based, hypocrite Huckabee's a fool if he thinks a Democratic opponent won't be making hay with the fact that Huckabee wanted Dumond free just to appease the Clinton-hating brigade. Romney won't find it expedient to point this out to Republican primary voters, but Huckabee would get killed with this in the general election if he got the GOP nomination.
The Caped Composer wrote on December 20, 2007 2:50 PM:What Larry said above-- "maybe if Bin Laden came and confessed his sins to Huck, he'd be forgive too and told to go on his merry way!"-- is precisely what a Democratic candidate needs to say about the Dumond case if Huckabee gets the nomination. Right there, that's how we win. Larry, I hope our nominee taps you for his/her campaign!
I'd love for Romney to explain on TV why Scooter Libby deserved a pardon, while the Iraq war veteran did not.
I actually think that if Huck plays this right, he could knock Romney out of the race. Many people are under the impression that Mitt Romney is a pandering phony with no real principles. This episode could easily reinforce that fear and sink him Iowa. If I'm Huck, I keep whacking Mitt on this until he drops.
Random Massachusetts Person wrote on December 20, 2007 3:32 PM:Nathan's comment is very important. The only person Romney ever thought deserved a pardon is Scooter Libby, who was decisively convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice. Regardless of how "politically motivated" the investigation was (by a Republican special prosecutor appointed by President Bush?), nobody contends that the conviction itself was political.
Why is this the one and only case where Romney would "go against the jury" and the law and pardon Libby?
pjsauter wrote on December 20, 2007 3:41 PM:Uh, I think that's supposed to be "he pushed for parole for a serial rapist..." not "serial racist" (though he may have been both).
Anonymous wrote on December 20, 2007 3:48 PM:Never underestimate the trivial minutiae on which people will base their votes (for example, see the Wellstone memorial service). Most people who hear a sound bite about this story will be sympathetic to Huckabee. I don't have the whole story but I did hear an audio interview with the Iraq veteran and he was not a sympathetic character. All he needed to do was say "As a kid, I made a stupid mistake and I'm sorry for it and I've learned from it." But he didn't say that. All he did was whine about how he would be such a great cop if Romney would just be reasonable and stop stomping on his dream. Sense of entitlement = 100%. Well Mr. Iraq hero, if you ever do get your wish and become a cop, you better be real careful with your weapon. Because if you shoot a civilian here, questions will be asked. Heck, maybe that childhood incident was Nature's way of telling you to become an accountant.
Personally, I think Romney and Huckabee are both clowns. But Huckabee is the scary clown because people will trust him--until it's too late.
fou wrote on December 20, 2007 4:10 PM:"serial racist"
I like it. Has a nice ring to it.
slb wrote on December 20, 2007 5:08 PM:But I do feel the state should change its laws regarding that... given the circumstances, I feel the law enforcement agencies should allow him to be a policeman since the event involved a BB gun that didn't break the skin and he was just a young teenager. So, I feel it's the laws and the law enforcement agency that should change to allow him to serve on the force instead of having a Governor override jury decisions.
It's because the strict and literal application of existing law can sometimes result in injustice in particular cases that a governor is given clemency power. Changing the law itself can be a long and drawn out process, and in any event, it is a blunt instrument -- you still may not be able to write blanket rules that apply to all cases that would give a fair result in absolutely every circumstance.
You might not want to be officials to be required to ignore juvenile gun offenses in every single case, but in this particular one, it is possible to say that the person has redeemed himself and is deserving of special consideration. That doesn't negate what the jury originally decided at all. I seriously doubt the jury ever asked themselves "but what if the guy volunteers for the armed forces and serves honorably in combat and then wants to become a policeman?" Even if they had, there is no provision for that kind of granularity in what the jury has the power to do. That's what the power of clemency is for -- to allow for some bending of the rules to accommodate unusual circumstances.
slb wrote on December 20, 2007 5:23 PM:Personally, I admire Romney's stance on pardons and clemency; it takes a pretty arrogant man to think his judgement is better than that of the whole legal system.
And I think it takes a pretty cruel and self-satisfied man to insist that the blunt instrument of the law should never be tempered for the sake of real justice.
The role of pardons and clemency given to the executive branch of government is intended as one of oversight, part of checks and balances, not as a matter of "judgement" at all.
What the hell does that mean? "Oversight, not judgement"?
An oversight role would imply to me that every single criminal judgement in every court in the state would have to be run through the executive branch for approval, and that is complete nonsense.
No, a clemency petition is a request to have a particular case evaluated on its individual merits by someone who is not bound by a strict application of the law, the way a judge and jury would be, and render an independent decision as to whether the petitioner is deserving of special consideration. Judgement on the part of the executive is precisely what is involved here.
Richard L. Adlof wrote on December 20, 2007 10:10 PM:Romney is just jealous that he did not do it first.
Richard wrote on December 21, 2007 1:21 AM:Sounds like he sold Scarborough with his story of Mitt denying a combat veteran.
You see its about forgiveness and redemption, and Mitt being a cult member knows not what he does, so to speak. Huck was saying volumes in strategy speak with his own response.
