Romney praises McCain for ‘Lincolnesque’ speech

2012 GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney praised Sen. John McCain (R) on Tuesday for his “Lincolnesque” speech, in which the Arizona senator warned about “half-baked, spurious nationalism.”

“Ran against him, sometimes disagree, but proud to be a friend of Sen. John McCain: hero, champion of character and last night, Lincolnesque,” Romney wrote on Twitter.

Ran against him, sometimes disagree, but proud to be a friend of @SenJohnMcCain: hero, champion of character and last night, Lincolnesque.

— Mitt Romney (@MittRomney) October 17, 2017

McCain warned of “spurious nationalism” during a speech Monday night in Philadelphia after receiving the National Constitution Center’s Liberty Medal.

{mosads}

While McCain did not directly mention President Trump, he appeared to take aim at the state of the nation under his administration by criticizing the abandonment of U.S. leadership abroad as “unpatriotic” and appearing to condemn white nationalist movements who are “consigned to the ash heap of history.” 

“To fear the world we have organized and led for three-quarters of a century, to abandon the ideals we have advanced around the globe, to refuse the obligations of international leadership and our duty to remain ‘the last best hope of earth’ for the sake of some half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems is as unpatriotic as an attachment to any other tired dogma of the past that Americans consigned to the ash heap of history,” McCain said in the speech.

“We live in a land made of ideals, not blood and soil,” the GOP senator said, adding that Americans “are the custodians of those ideals at home, and their champion abroad.”

The Nazi slogan “blood and soil” was echoed in chants by white supremacist groups who sparked violence in Charlottesville, Va., in August.

Trump, in response to the speech, told WMAL radio host Chris Plante that “at some point, I fight back and it won’t be pretty.”

McCain appeared to brush off the comments, telling CNN shortly afterward that he has “faced far greater challenges than this.”