Romney remarks on Olympic Games distract from visit

July 27, 2012 at 12:00a.m.

Los Angeles Times

LONDON

Mitt Romney had intended to start his foreign trip on a high note, but his message of statesmanship and friendship between nations was quickly drowned out by a British media frenzy over a remark he made about some early glitches in the handling of the Olympic Games that open here today.

The presumed Republican nominee spent Thursday in a round of meetings with current and former British leaders, but he was met with questions from the British and American media about his comment Thursday night to “NBC Nightly News” anchor Brian Williams that some of the early Olympic reports had been “disconcerting.”

“The stories about the private security firm not having enough people, the supposed strike of the immigration and customs officials, that obviously is not something which is encouraging,” Romney told Williams.

Never mind that Romney has, for the most part, spoken glowingly of the Olympic events in London and the imaginative approach that leaders have taken here: He was greeted Thursday with a front-page opinion headline in one of London’s morning papers taking issue with what was framed as his guile.

Before meeting Romney in the afternoon, Prime Minister David Cameron appeared to push back against the suggestion that anything was awry, saying England would “show the whole world, not just that we come together as a United Kingdom, but also, we’re extremely good at welcoming people from across the world.”

Without specifically being asked about Romney’s comments, he volunteered that England was hosting the Olympic Games “in one of the busiest, most active, bustling cities anywhere in the world. ... Of course it’s easier if you hold an Olympic Games in the middle of nowhere.” (The British media seized on that comment as a reference to Salt Lake City, where Romney headed the Olympics in 2002.)

By midafternoon, as the Olympic torch arrived in Hyde Park, London Mayor Boris Johnson was using Romney as a prop, whipping up the crowd by yelling: “I hear there is a guy called Mitt Romney who wants to know whether we are ready. ... Are we ready?” “Yes!” the crowd yelled back.