Romney pivots from Social Security to illegal immigration against Perry

By Matt Viser, Globe Staff

ORLANDO, Fla. – After a feisty debate last night, Mitt Romney this morning continued jabbing at top rival Rick Perry, renewing his attack on the Texas governor for signing a law that allows illegal immigrants to pay in-state tuition rates at public colleges and universities.

“My friend Governor Perry said that if you don’t agree with his position on giving that in state tuition to illegals, that you don’t have a heart,” Romney said in a 15-minute speech before a large gathering of conservatives. “Um. I think if you’re opposed to illegal immigration, it doesn’t mean that you don’t have a heart. It means that you have a heart and a brain.”

“Legal immigration, good for America,” he said. “Illegal immigration, something I will stop if I’m president.”

The lines got loud applause and indicated that the former Massachusetts governor – after weeks of casting Perry as too out-of-the-mainstream to win the general election - will continue trying to hammer Perry over an immigration stance that doesn’t sit well among most Republicans.

Tellingly, Romney never mentioned Social Security, the issue he has used day after day to criticize Perry, who has called the retirement program a “Ponzi scheme.”

Romney was among the first speakers to address the gathering of the Conservative Political Action Conference. Perry is scheduled to speak this afternoon.

Romney, as he’s done several times recently, showed the crowd a single piece of paper scrawled with notes to make a point that he would be speaking extemporaneously even if many of his talking points seemed memorized.

“Got some notes here,” he said. “I don’t know if I’ll get a chance to look at them.”

Romney stuck to his campaign theme, focusing on the economy and rarely mentioning the red meat topics of repealing the Obama administration’s health care overhaul and adhering to the constitution.

He spent much of his remarks to a discussion on the differences between government and the private sector (at one point Romney, a former venture capitalist and a friend of Excel spreadsheets, said, “In government, they have tons and tons of data. They just don’t look at it.”)

But it was Perry’s stance on immigration that Romney seemed most focused on driving home a day after a high-profile debate.

In 2001, Perry signed a law allowing illegal immigrants to obtain in-state tuition. Romney, who as governor of Massachusetts vetoed similar legislation in 2004, has criticized Perry for the policy.

He reiterated a line from last night’s debate that the law gives a student in the country illegally “nearly a $100,000 discount” over tuition rates paid by US citizens who live outside Texas.

Perry last night did not back away from the law, but drew scattered boos from the audience as he argued that the law helps young illegal immigrants become productive members of society.

“If you say that we should not educate children coming into our state … brought there by no fault of their own, I don’t think you have a heart,” Perry said. “We need to be educating these children because (if not) they will become a drag on our society.”

Romney also reiterated that he supports building a fence along the southern border, something Perry has said does not make sense.

Representative Michele Bachmann, who spoke just before Romney, also contrasted her positions with Perry, although she did not mention him by name.

“As president of the United States, I will build a fence on our southern border against illegal immigration!” said the Minnesota congresswoman. “And we will not have taxpayer subsidized benefits for illegal immigrants or for their children.”

She also worked the crowd into a frenzy by telling them not to elect a moderate as a way to win the general election, saying, “We need a nominee who’s not afraid of the Tea Party!”

“We don’t settle this time,” Bachmann said. “If there’s ever been a year that we don’t settle and sit next to the wall, and go to the back of the bus - we conservatives have to say, ‘No.’ This is our year. This is our time. And we’re going to have our nominee!”