SWEETWATER, Fla. — Republican Mitt Romney sought to lock up the Florida primary by talking Sunday about little else but the economic jitters confronting the nation. His rivals took different tacks toward the same goal as they fanned out across the Sunshine State.
Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, lashed top rival John McCain for admitting less familiarity with the economy than foreign affairs, telling a rally outside Miami: “No one needs to give me a briefing on the economy. I won’t need to choose a vice president that understands the economy — because I know the economy.”
A day after McCain accused him of supporting a timetable for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq, Romney also told a reporter McCain was “lying” before catching himself and saying, “I’m saying he made a dishonest comment. I misspoke.”
McCain defended himself at a town hall meeting in Polk City when a questioner challenged the Arizona senator’s votes against Bush tax cuts. McCain now says those tax cuts should be made permanent.
“I opposed the tax cuts because I saw no restraint in the growth of spending. We let spending get out of control,” McCain said.
Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani contrasted himself with the two in both style and substance.
“I’ve traveled up and down the state of Florida, talked to a lot of people and listened to you,” he said in Vero Beach. “That’s why I support a national catastrophe fund. I’m the only Republican candidate in this race supporting it — and I need your vote in order to accomplish it.”
Giuliani has lost six straight contests. He has pinned his candidacy on a Florida win but is badly trailing and is facing money woes. Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, is all but broke and barely playing in Florida.
At stake Tuesday are 57 delegates to the national convention. Florida lost half its GOP delegates as punishment from the national party for moving its primary to earlier in the year.
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