Conservative PAC hosts Romney

WASHINGTON -- Seeking to cement ties with conservatives in the Republican Party, Governor Mitt Romney yesterday attended a fund-raiser held by a group of right-leaning GOP representatives who recently established a political action committee to bolster their ranks in the US House.

Romney, who is readying a possible run for the GOP presidential nomination in 2008, is the first potential White House candidate to attend an event held by the House Conservatives Fund, according to its executive director, Sean McCaffrey.

Its founders are abortion opponents and fiscal conservatives who set up the fund this spring with the main goal of boosting conservative GOP congressional candidates, including those in primary fights with moderate Republicans. The founders have vowed not to try to unseat incumbent Republicans.

Before speaking to the group last night, Romney emphasized in an interview with the Globe that he has spoken to GOP groups of all stripes. ''We're a 'big tent' party," Romney said. ''No party wants to narrow its base. I have had the privilege of speaking to groups from both sides of the party and those right down the center."

Romney also declined to endorse the antiabortion stance of the PAC's founders.

''I haven't looked at this particular group's stand on the issues," he said. ''I do know it's a solid Republican group that supports Republican candidates. So do I. I'm certainly a fiscal conservative.

''I think my record in Massachusetts shows I don't raise taxes and I don't borrow money, and on that basis at least we're down the line together. And on social issues, you have to look one by one."

Romney said during his 1994 run for US Senate that he believed abortion should be ''safe and legal" and as a candidate for governor in 2002, he said he would keep the state's abortion rights laws intact. But this year he said he was ''in a different place" on abortion. Recently he has declined to stake out a position on a bill in the Legislature that would broaden access to the early contraception pill.

A GOP abortion rights activist complained that last night's event was part of Romney's effort to move away from moderate positions he took as a candidate for governor.

''There's becoming a larger rift in our party as 'conservative' increasingly takes on the definition of 'social conservative' on issues 20 percent of us agree on, instead of on issues of spending and national defense that 80 percent of us agree on," said Kellie Ferguson, executive director of Republican Majority for Choice, an abortion rights group that endorsed Romney for governor in 2002. ''As candidates change their positions to pander like Governor Romney, the rift is only growing larger."

The fund-raiser, with a minimum donation of $1,000, was intended to pump tens of thousands of dollars into the PAC, which is chaired by Representative Ernest Istook of Oklahoma. It was held at the offices of DC Navigators, Romney's political strategy firm in Washington.

The Commonwealth PAC, set up to promote Romney in key states, was also listed as a host.

Invitations for the event said that guests seeking the ''host" designation were expected to contribute $5,000 and ''co-hosts" $2,000.

Last night's event was closed to the media. Eric Fehrnstrom, Romney's communications director, said the governor was expected to speak about ''fiscal conservatism and fiscal restraint."

Representative Mike Sodrel, an Indiana Republican, described Romney as ''very personable," but added that Romney's home state could be a problem if the governor decides to run for president.

''For Midwesterners, Massachusetts is going to take a lot of selling, putting it as delicately as I can," Sodrel said after Romney gave a speech to the crowd of about 75 members of Congress, GOP strategists, and lobbyists.

Asked for his reaction to Romney's speech, House majority leader Tom DeLay of Texas quipped: ''I like him, but I don't want to ruin his chances in Massachusetts."

Romney is expected to make a decision on whether he will run for president by this fall. Istook emphasized that the House Conservatives Fund was not endorsing a presidential candidate.

Marvin Overby, a professor of political science at the University of Missouri at Columbia, observed yesterday that Romney must reach out to groups like the conservatives' PAC to be a viable contender in the 2008 Republican presidential primaries.

''My guess is, what he's trying to do is burnish his conservative bona fides," said Overby, who just coauthored a study on GOP turnover in Congress. ''He will be the odds-on favorite for moderate and liberal Republicans, but he needs the folks from Tennessee and Alabama."

This spring, the House Conservatives Fund staged an introductory fund-raiser at the Washington restaurant La Colline, attracting a crowd that included House Speaker Dennis Hastert, majority whip Roy Blunt, and chief deputy whip Eric Cantor.

Romney's visit to Washington yesterday included a meeting with former Michigan governor John Engler, who is now president of the National Association of Manufacturers, to discuss Romney's recent proposal to overhaul Massachusetts' health insurance laws by requiring citizens, rather than employers, to purchase coverage.