Mitt Romney has emerged as a serious candidate for secretary of state following his meeting with President-elect Donald Trump, CBS News reported on Tuesday.
A source close to the transition team said the meeting was initially scheduled as a courtesy visit and could have been strained due to the animosity between the two during the presidential campaign. However, Trump was so impressed by their conversation that he has reconsidered his initial thinking that former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani was the right man for the job.
Hot Air, however, noted that Trump mentioned to the press that Romney desperately wanted the job and viewed that as an indication that Trump arranged the meeting merely for show and could now be used to embarrass his rival when he is not chosen or at some later point when Romney might criticize the president.
The site suggested that Romney, the 2012 Republican nominee for president, should have stipulated before the meeting that it was merely a goodwill call and he was not seeking a position, so that Trump could not claim later that Romney begged him for a job.
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee took a different view of the possibility of Romney as secretary of state, telling Fox News that "I don't see any way in the world that Mitt Romney would have a cabinet position in the Donald Trump administration."
He added that Romney should have apologized to Trump and emphasized that "It would be an insult to the supporters of Donald Trump, who went out there and faithfully stood behind Donald Trump, to give a guy a job who basically said all those supporters were following a con man."
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