Republican Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal has become one of the most outspoken critics of his own party and its presidential nominee Mitt Romney in the wake of their defeat in this month’s general election campaign.
Jindal has called on the GOP to stop being the “stupid” party and argued that the Romney’s campaign failed because “his campaign was largely about his biography and his experience. But time and time again, biography and experience is not enough to win an election. You have to have a vision.”
“We need to acknowledge the fact that we got beat,” Jindal added. “We clearly got beat and we need to recognize that.”
However, Romney himself has sparked controversy with his own take on the results, saying privately that minorities and youth voters flocked to support Obamas re-election because they expected “gifts” in return from his administration.
“The president’s campaign focused on giving targeted groups a big gift—so he made a big effort on small things. Those small things, by the way, add up to trillions of dollars,” Romney said in conference call with GOP donors.
“Free contraceptives were very big with young college-aged women. And then, finally, Obamacare also made a difference for them, because as you know, anybody now 26 years of age and younger was now going to be part of their parents’ plan, and that was a big gift to young people. They turned out in large numbers, a larger share in this election even than in 2008,” claimed Romney.
Romney also said that “free health care” was a “big plus” for Latino and black voters who backed the president by historically wide margins in the election.
Jindal, who campaigned aggressively for Romney during the election season, has become one of the first prominent Republicans to speak out against Romney’s analysis.
“That is absolutely wrong,” Jindal said at Wednesday’s session of the annual Republican Governors Association meeting in Las Vegas, according to the Washington Examiner‘s Byron York. “I absolutely reject that notion.”
“I don’t think that represents where we are as a party and where we’re going as a party,” Jindal continued. “That has got to be one of the most fundamental takeaways from this election: If we’re going to continue to be a competitive party and win elections on the national stage and continue to fight for our conservative principles, we need two messages to get out loudly and clearly: One, we are fighting for 100 percent of the votes, and secondly, our policies benefit every American who wants to pursue the American dream. Period. No exceptions.”
Jindal was long rumored to be a potential contender for the 2012 Republican presidential and vice presidential slots but he declined to run.