TROY, MICHIGAN — Still on a quest to prove his social conservative bona fides against chief rival Rick Santorum, Mitt Romney told a tea party crowd here Saturday that he stood tall against gay marriage and cloning while governor of Massachusetts.
The two ideas were juxtaposed in his speech — his fight against legalized same-sex marriage and what he called his battle against “cloning and embryo farming” came as part of a single thought — and were received well by the crowd here, which was gathered for an Americans For Prosperity event.
Most of Romney’s speech was a standard stump speech, but he did take time out to attack Santorum by reminding the crowd Santorum had endorsed him in 2008.
Here’s the section about the gay marriage and cloning, which are part of Romney’s continuing efforts to cast himself as a culture warrior since Santorum rose in the polls.
I also faced a Supreme Court in my state that said John Adams had written into our constitution a right to marriage between people of the same gender. And I became the nation’s champion to reverse that with an amendment in our state. We were on progress to do that until I saw a Democrat take over the governor’s office. And then we also had the legislature pass a bill saying we will allow cloning and embryo farming in our state. They wanted to change the definition of when life began. And I stood up and said absolutely not and I vetoed that legislation. I am a pro-life governor — I was a pro-life governor and I’m still a pro-life candidate. I was a pro-traditional marriage governor and am so as a candidate and I am a conservative.
