WASHINGTON, D.C., July 13, 2012, (LifeSiteNews.com) – The Drudge Report broke the news last night that Mitt Romney is actively considering former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice – a supporter of abortion and homosexual unions, who is widely believed to have voted for Barack Obama – as his vice presidential running-mate.
Rice ignited speculation after giving a rousing, 13-minute-long speech to Romney donors in Park City, Utah. (The full speech can be heard here.) In a rare fit of enthusiasm for his candidacy, she told activists to “storm Washington, D.C.” on his behalf.
But Condoleezza’s record on issues ranging from abortion to homosexuality, racial preferences to the possibility that she voted for the current president, are giving conservatives across the spectrum pause.
Condoleeza Rice has described her views on abortion as “mildly pro-choice” since at least 1999. She said abortion “should be an issue pretty infrequently…We should not have the federal government in a position where it is forcing its views on one side or the other.”
Although she supports parental notification and opposes late-term abortions, she remains “concerned about a government role in this issue” and merely believes abortion should be “as rare a circumstance as possible.” She added, “I hope there will be fewer and fewer.”
In response to the VP speculation, Susan B. Anthony List President Marjorie Dannenfelser pointed out that Romney had promised a pro-life running mate. “Former Secretary Rice’s position on the sanctity of human life makes her an unqualified candidate for Governor Romney to choose as a running mate,” Dannenfelser said. “Throughout the campaign, including at the Palmetto Freedom Forum last September, he has pledged to us in no uncertain terms that he would choose a pro-life running mate.
“We have taken Governor Romney at his word and therefore believe Secretary Rice will be ruled out of consideration. Secretary Rice’s position violates criteria that Governor Romney himself has laid out.”
Rice’s record of positive comments about the president may also undermine her ability to fulfill the vice president’s traditional role as an attack dog, beginning with the possibility that she voted for the incumbent four years ago.
While part of a Republican administration, Rice hinted broadly that she may have voted for Barack Obama in 2008. She demurred from answering a CBS reporter’s question about the “widely held belief in Washington, anyway, that you voted for Barack Obama,” but many observers interpreted her comments as a tacit admission.
After Obama’s victory, Rice said she was “especially proud” of his election, calling him “inspirational.”
She has since defended his administration. After meeting Obama in October 2010, Rice said nothing in Obama’s performance “suggests this president is other than a defender of America’s interests,” adding that Hillary Clinton “has done a fine job” on foreign policy.
Rice has also voiced support for some form of legal unions for homosexuals.“I know a lot of very stable gay couples,” she said, “and I hope we find a way they can have a legal foundation” to recognize the relationship.
A number of other factors may dim her appeal to the Republican Party’s base, as well as the general electorate.
She was one of the “Vulcans” who helped forge George W. Bush’s activist foreign policy, which remains a political liability. She supports Affirmative Action in college admissions and other circumstances when it is “practiced well.”
She criticized Newt Gingrich’s attacks on Obama’s radical family influences, something she noted she and the president share in her book ExtraOrdinary Ordinary People. She wrote that her father, a Presbyterian minister, began as “a conservative Republican” but as a college administrator became “fascinated with the radical side of black politics,” supporting people like Louis Farrakhan and Stokely Carmichael. “Years later, when so much attention was paid to then-Senator Obama’s radical associations, I wondered what might have been made of the people who sat at our dinner table,” she wrote.
However, the Rice-for-vice boomlet may prove a passing phenomenon, as she does not appear to want the job.
She quelled another bout of vice presidential speculation last month, saying, “There is no way that I will do this, because it’s really not me.”
Most conservatives and pro-life advocates hope she will hold to that position.
Other candidates who are said to be on the vice presidential short list include Ohio Senator Rob Portman, who has a 100 percent voting record with National Right to Life; Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, whom longtime associates say is secretly pro-choice; and Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell, who recently shocked Virginia pro-life leaders by liberalizing his stance on abortion. McDonnell will be chair the Republican National Convention’s platform committee this summer.