Romney cites Olympics success; rivals are leery of money spent

Associated Press

SALT LAKE CITY

Mitt Romney returned to Salt Lake City on Saturday to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the 2002 Winter Games he helped lead, but the GOP presidential candidate came under attack for urging the federal government to provide big bucks for Olympic expenses.

Romney was hired to lead the Salt Lake Olympic Committee after a bribery scandal threatened the games. The success of those Olympics, he says during the campaign, help make the case for his bid for the White House. “I led an Olympics out of the shadows of scandal,” Romney told conservative activists this month.

He planned to address former members of the committee Saturday evening and speak at an ice-skating exhibition celebrating the anniversary.

“The Olympics was really the first place where the entire country got to know” him, said spokeswoman Gail Gitcho.” It propelled him into the national spotlight.”

But his opponents are attacking his record at the games, with both Democrats and GOP presidential rival Rick Santorum criticizing Romney for helping to secure millions in federal earmarks that helped cover Olympic costs.

“One of the things he talks about most is how he heroically showed up on the scene and bailed out and resolved the problems of the Salt Lake City Olympic Games,” Santorum said during a campaign stop in Columbus, Ohio. “He heroically bailed out the Salt Lake City Olympic Games by heroically going to Congress and asking them for tens of millions of dollars to bail out the Salt Lake games — in an earmark.”