Romney: McCain uses Nixon tactics

LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) — Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Thursday accused his rival John McCain of adopting underhanded tactics from Richard Nixon, the GOP president who resigned in disgrace.

“I don’t think I want to see our party go back to that kind of campaigning,” Romney said in his most pointed rebuttal yet to front-runner McCain’s claim that the former Massachusetts governor favors a timetable for withdrawing troops from Iraq. Romney denies this charge, and most media analyses have concluded that Romney wasn’t using ‘timetable’ in the same way Democratic candidates have.

McCain’s decision to level the timetable charge this week without leaving Romney time to rebut it before Florida Republicans voted in their primary “was reminiscent of the Nixon era,” Romney said.

McCain ended up winning the Florida contest Tuesday.

McCain adviser Steve Schmidt responded that “John McCain has simply pointed out a fundamental difference between them at the time when John McCain was advocating a strategy for victory.”

A prominent Romney surrogate, former House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois, also chimed in Thursday with a reference to McCain’s own scandal history. Hastert told reporters that he had worked with McCain on legislation early in his congressional career but “after the Keating Five scandal, he changed.”

McCain was one of five senators involved in the Keating Five savings-and-loan scandal.