Romney holds on to his base in Bay State

Suburbanites stick with ex-governor

At 6:52 a.m. yesterday, Dunstable Town Clerk Carol Skerrett (center) gave last-minute instructions to poll checkers Norman Lombardi (left) and Mary DeBarbin, while Francis Hyatt waited for 7 o'clock to cast the first vote of the day. (MARK WILSON/GLOBE STAFF)

MEDWAY - When he ran for governor in 2002, Mitt Romney's campaign as a business executive who would bring order to Beacon Hill and fight taxes resonated with independent suburban voters like David Langille, a Medway landscaper. Yesterday Langille voted for Romney again, though this time he saw the candidate in a somewhat different light.

"I think he's a true Republican, as opposed to McCain," said Langille, who voted for Romney in the Republican presidential primary in part because he considered him to be the toughest on illegal immigration. Langille, a 43-year-old small business owner, said he has lost landscaping jobs in recent years to those who charge less but employ undocumented workers.

In winning the Massachusetts presidential primary, Romney retained many of his old supporters, even if some were drawn this time for much different reasons. Others voted for him because of his corporate resume, his term as governor, even home-state pride.

"He's more of a real Republican," said Leo Cullen, a 24-year-old registered Republican and Medway carpenter who cited the economy, the housing market, and immigration as his top issues.

"I like what he stands for," especially on the economy, said Frances Wood, a soon-to-be 80-year-old Ashland Republican who described herself as "retired from life." "They say he's a flip-flopper, but I don't think he is."

In 2002, Romney cleaned up in towns like Ashland and Medway, where he beat Democrat Shannon O'Brien by more than 2 to 1. In Boston's western suburbs and especially in exurban communities near Interstate 495, where many voters are socially moderate or liberal but economically conservative, Romney scored the victory margins he needed to beat O'Brien five years ago, said Robert David Sullivan, who analyzes election data for the nonpartisan think tank MassINC.

"He definitely won them because he ran as a moderate Republican," said Sullivan, managing editor of CommonWealth, the magazine published by MassINC. This year, "he's running to the right of McCain."

As a result, Romney had to overcome a strain of disenchantment yesterday in many of his old suburban strongholds. Several voters interviewed outside the polls identified themselves as past supporters who said they now considered Romney to be a political opportunist or felt alienated by what they perceived to be a not-so-subtle shift to the right. Some said they were dissatisfied with his term as governor.

In the towns where Romney once appealed to independent and moderate voters when matched against O'Brien, he lost some of those voters yesterday to Republican opponent John McCain, himself no stranger to independent support, or to candidates in the closely contested Democratic primary.

"I've come to dislike him," said Fred Paulette, a retired Medway police officer and Marine Corps veteran who voted for Romney in 2002 but supported Hillary Clinton in the Democratic presidential primary yesterday - partly because he wants a Democrat to get the United States out of Iraq, and partly because he didn't think Romney accomplished much on Beacon Hill. "My opinion of him is the day he took the governor's office, he clearly had the presidency in mind," Paulette said.

Although Paulette, 67, is a registered Democrat, he has cast votes for Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and both Bush presidents. His vote for Clinton yesterday and dissatisfaction with Romney sounded like blasphemy to Rosemary Bauer, another Medway resident.

"Freddy, he's gone crazy; we're going to put him in a nursing home," said Bauer, a 78-year-old Republican.

But even though Bauer called Romney a fine governor, she didn't vote for him, saying John McCain - as a longtime senator, Navy veteran, and former prisoner of war - is better suited as a wartime president.

"I don't think Romney's up for that," said Bauer, who is retired from real estate. "We do need to have a strong president, and I think McCain's the man."

While Romney drew votes from full-fledged supporters and those who considered him merely the best of an unexciting field, he had also alienated some who voted against him yesterday.

Mike Beaumont, a Westwood independent, did not hesitate when asked why he voted for McCain. "The anti-Romney vote," said Beaumont, 57, an insurance broker and former town selectman in Westwood, where Romney beat O'Brien four years ago by 30 percentage points. He called Romney "kind of a plastic guy, really doesn't keep in touch with the common folk, if you will."

Charles Johnston, an Ashland Republican, said he didn't hesitate to vote for Romney again. "I like that he has a firm grasp on economic issues," said Johnston, a 47-year-old who works in the financial industry.

But other supporters said they understood why some might criticize Romney. Langille, the Medway landscaper, said he didn't fault Romney for hiring a landscaping firm that employed illegal immigrants at his Belmont home, and he accepted that the former governor had adjusted his message to court a national audience.

"Yeah, I know, he's flip-flopped on some stuff," said Langille, who considered Romney a successful governor. "But don't they all to get votes?"