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 In an unusually harsh speech, party elder Romney warned that
former reality TV star Trump would likely lose to possible
Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton in the Nov. 8 election if he
becomes the Republican nominee.
Trump's rise has split the Republican Party between mainstream
figures like Romney, and Trump supporters who complain the party
does not reflect their concerns about illegal immigration, the slow
economic recovery and what they see as America's diminishing role in
the world.
That split widened when Romney, the party nominee in 2012, urged
Republican primary voters to vote tactically in different states to
back Trump's opponents and block his path to the nomination.
"Here's what I know. Donald Trump is a phony, a fraud," said Romney,
68, who did not endorse any candidate.
 "I would vote for Marco Rubio in Florida, for John Kasich in Ohio,
and for Ted Cruz or whichever one of the other two contenders has
the best chance of beating Mr. Trump in a given state," he said.
Rubio is a U.S. senator from Florida and Kasich is the Ohio
governor.
By calling for targeted voting, Romney was setting up the
possibility of a contested convention when Republicans gather in
Cleveland in mid-July to select their nominee for the November
election to succeed Democratic President Barack Obama. That could
create a pathway to deny Trump the 1,237 delegates needed for
nomination.
The last Republican convention to go beyond one ballot was in 1948
when Thomas Dewey was nominated.
"I think the governor is just being realistic about where things
stand and advocating a potential strategy that could stop the Trump
nomination,” said former Romney spokesman Ryan Williams.
ESTABLISHMENT UNEASE
Republican strategist Scott Reed said he doubted the last-ditch
tactical voting suggestion would work. "No one will be playing the
targeted voting game. There’s too much anger and distrust," Reed
said.
Trump, 69, has made his party's establishment uneasy with his
abrasive tone and policy positions, including plans to build a wall
on the U.S.-Mexican border, deport 11 million illegal immigrants and
temporarily bar Muslims from entering the country.
More than 90 Republican national security leaders have signed a
scathing open letter opposing Trump and his stance on many foreign
policy issues.
Romney's speech in Utah was the spearhead of a mainstream Republican
attempt to rein in Trump after he won most states in this week's
Republican Super Tuesday nominating contests and took a step toward
earning the nomination.
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The address came hours before Trump and his rivals shared a stage in
Detroit at 9 p.m. EST for a debate hosted by Fox News.
Trump leads many polls for primaries in the remaining states,
including in major ones like Florida on March 15, dampening
prospects of derailing him.
The party establishment's strategy risks backfiring by further
energizing Trump's supporters, many of them white, blue-collar
voters.
"If only Romney talked like this four years ago about Obama ... or
Trump," conservative political commentator Michelle Malkin said on
Twitter. "Too freaking late and too freaking lame."
'FAILED CANDIDATE'
Trump dismissed the former Massachusetts governor who lost to Obama
four years ago. "Mitt is a failed candidate. He failed. He failed
horribly. He failed badly," Trump told a rally in Maine.
Romney decided on his own to give the speech, which he wrote
himself. Romney said Trump's economic policy would sink America
"into prolonged recession," mocked Trump's ego, and called him a
"con man."
"A business genius he is not," Romney said.
David Axelrod, a former senior adviser to Obama, called the Romney
speech a "break glass" moment he had not seen since 1964, when
Republicans abandoned their candidate Barry Goldwater.
Axelrod noted thousands of Republicans had already voted for Trump
in primary elections. "I wonder about tactic of calling them fools,"
Axelrod wrote on Twitter.
(Additional reporting by Doina Chiacu, Eric Beech, Warren Strobel,
Jonathan Landay and Matt Spetalnick in Washington; Writing by Steve
Holland, Roberta Rampton; Editing by Alistair Bell and Peter Cooney)
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