Sen. Mitt Romney gets a call from the president during an interview
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Utah Sen. Mitt Romney and his wife, Ann Romney, were sitting for an interview that aired Sunday on CBS when they were interrupted by a phone call from the president of the United States.
“We might have to pull the senator for a call with the president,” a staffer told CBS News host Norah O’Donnell, as aides began stripping the lavaliere microphone, and its wire, off the senator.
“Do you have to be on a secure line?” O’Donnell wondered out loud.
Biden reportedly called before traveling to Israel last week, only a few days after Romney’s own visit.
“This has been a heartbreaking, heart-wrenching experience, for me, for my colleagues, for the world,” said Romney, a Republican, at a press conference in Israel on Oct. 15.
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The senator said he would never forget meeting the families of hostages. “And I can only imagine the horror in their lives. My heart reaches out to them, my prayers join with yours to see those hostages returned to their loved ones,” he said.
Romney and other members of the Senate delegation had to shelter during an air raid siren while in Israel.
Biden, too, spent nearly seven hours in the Israeli war zone. During his trip, he pushed for humanitarian aid to Gaza to be unblocked, amid bombardment from Israel that began after the Hamas attacks on civilians on Oct. 7.
Biden’s visit to the Middle East coincided with an explosion at the Al-Ahli al-Arabi hospital last week, which, as Reuters reported, was fired from within Gaza. This derailed his administration's plans for a diplomatic trip to the Middle East as Arab countries called off their meeting with Biden.
But his statements in the initial fog of war — especially the awkwardly phrased, “It appears as though it was done by the other team, not you,” — when expressing support for Israel after the hospital blast were met with criticism, according to CNN.
Former foes, now friends
Biden and Romney took plenty of shots at each other during the 2012 presidential campaign when Romney was the Republican presidential nominee and Biden was running for reelection as vice president.
They became friends on first-name-basis after Romney was one of three Republicans to confirm Biden’s nominee for the Supreme Court, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson in April 2022.
As the Deseret News previously reported, Romney’s latest biography details the surprising friendship between the two as they would talk on the phone about anything from work to aging in the spotlight.
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“I just wanted to call and tell you that I admire your character,” Biden once told Romney during one such phone call.
In “Romney: A Reckoning,” author McKay Coppins writes that Romney gave the president tips on how to look younger when he walked.
But friendship aside, Romney wants what’s best for his country, which isn’t a Biden-Trump rematch in 2024.
Romney told Politico that while he is “not a Biden supporter,” he said he “can’t vote for Donald Trump.
The Utah senator has urged Republicans to coalesce around a single choice to take on Trump in the Republican primary. He has also encouraged several Democratic senators — including Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey and Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia — to run against Biden.
