Mitt Romney Not Sure He Will Take Part in Florida GOP Debates

It seems Mitt Romney is not sure he will take part in the two debates next week leading up to the Florida GOP Primary. He’s committed to this Thursday’s CNN Debate in South Carolina, but his campaign is making no commitments to him being a part of the Florida debates:

WASHINGTON EXAMINER: After a debate in which Republican frontrunner Mitt Romney faced attacks from all sides, the Romney campaign says it has not yet accepted invitations to participate in two high-profile debates leading up to the January 31 Florida primary, and a key Romney adviser is expressing fatigue and frustration over what he sees as a never-ending series of GOP debates.

“There are too many of these,” Romney strategist Stuart Stevens said after Monday night’s Fox News debate at the Myrtle Beach Convention Center. “We have to bring some order to it. We haven’t accepted Florida…It’s kind of like a cruise that’s gone on too long.”

Romney will participate in the next South Carolina debate, Thursday night in Charleston. Asked by email about the candidate’s debate schedule after that, Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul said, “I have no announcements to make on debates at this time.”

As part of his complaint against the current debate schedule, Stevens expressed lingering irritation at the January 7 ABC News debate in New Hampshire, in which Romney faced a long a tendentious series of questions about contraception. (“It was such a lousy debate,” Stevens said.) More generally, Stevens suggested that in the long course of the campaign, this year’s key issues have been exhausted. “We’re down to the most obscure questions,” he said. “When more than ten debates mention Chilean models, and it’s not a fashion show, then something’s wrong.”

There’s no doubt the debate schedule has been intense. Seventy hours after the end of Monday night’s session, the second South Carolina debate will begin down the coast in Charleston. Then, 48 hours after the polls close late Saturday in South Carolina, there will be another debate, this one in Tampa. Seventy-two hours after that, there will be yet another debate, this one in Jacksonville. The Charleston, Tampa, and Jacksonville debates will be the 17th, 18th, and 19th of the Republican primary season. Add that to the schedule of actual campaigning, and it’s a routine that is wearing down all the campaigns. . . . Read More

That would be a disaster for Mitt Romney. He is kidding himself if he thinks he can just not show up for the two Florida debates leading up to the primary and it not hurt him big time. These debates are far more important that the debates from long ago, because they will be fresh in the minds of voters. Romney will come off looking like a coward if he just refuses to show up. He may be tired of the debates, but he had better rethink this strategy.