If Mitt Romney can’t run for president this time, he can at least play kingmaker.
The 2012 Republican nominee who pondered mounting a third campaign for the White House in 2016 is hosting half a dozen presidential hopefuls in Park City, Utah, this weekend. But this isn’t your normal cattle call. Instead of just hearing stump speeches, high-rolling donors can engage in activities like touch football with Marco Rubio and skeet shooting with Lindsey Graham.
The retreat originated from a 2012 gathering of Romney donors when the former Massachusetts governor was running for president. Since then it has transformed into a far more wide-ranging event: among the invited guests are Barack Obama’s top strategist David Axelrod, former Today Show host Katie Couric and former NBA commissioner David Stern. While roughly 50 journalists are camping outside the closed press event in hopes of gathering some morsel of news, at least one journalist is a guest. Bloomberg reporter Mark Halperin will be hosting “sunrise pilates” with Romney’s wife Ann on Saturday morning.
Along with these celebrities, there will be six GOP presidential candidates attending. Besides Rubio and Graham, three Republican governors – Scott Walker, Chris Christie and John Kasich – will be there plus the former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina. The candidates hope to use the event to woo some of the donors who helped fund Romney’s billion-dollar campaign in 2012. For Romney, it’s a chance to stay relevant as well as engage in fun activities like “hiking with Kelly Ayotte”, the New Hampshire senator.
Two other presidential candidates were reportedly invited to the event. Former Florida governor Jeb Bush is currently on a European tour, while Kentucky senator Rand Paul has events scheduled in California this weekend.
