Mitt Romney bused in audience members for a taping of an appearance on a Spanish-language network last week, muscling organizers at the last minute to ensure a supportive crowd.
The Univision candidate forums held were intended to have audiences of students. But when the Romney campaign couldn’t find enough Republican University of Miami students, the GOP nominee threatened to reschedule the event if he wasn’t allowed to bus in activists from south Florida, Buzzfeed reported. Filled with Republican activists, Romney’s audience chanted ‘Romney! Romney! Romney!’ when the governor took the stage. The audience for President Obama, which stuck with the original agreement and was comprised of mostly students, was far quieter, prompting the Romney campaign to brag about Mitt’s rousing reception.
This isn’t the first time Romney’s bused in racially-appropriate supporters: In July, the candidate bussed in black conservatives for an NAACP speech, Lean Forward reported at the time. “We were a little bit thrown because it was supposed to be a TV show, it wasn’t a rally,” event co-moderator Maria Elena Salinas said of the outspoken Romney supporters. “It was a little bit of disrespect for us.”
“I’m surprised he didn’t come out with a sombrero on his head because he was doing everything he could to pretend to love Hispanics,” Miami-Dade Democrat Annette Taddeo said on The Ed Show Monday. In video footage from a private fundraiser in May, posted online last week, Romney joked that winning the 2012 election would be easier if his father, who was born in Mexico, was actually Mexican. “Had he been born of Mexican parents,” Romney said, “I’d have a better shot of winning this.” He added, “I say that jokingly, but it would be helpful to be Latino.”
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