Mitt Romney decided on Wednesday to stop telling the story about his chance meeting with Glenn Doherty, the former Navy SEAL who was killed during the terrorist attacks on the U.S. consulate in Libya, after Doherty’s family complained Romney was using the story for political gain.
On the stump, Romney had been telling the story about meeting Doherty, who is from Massachusetts, and said he was “shocked” to learn Doherty had been killed on the eleventh anniversary of 9/11 in Libya.
Romney met Doherty at a Christmas party and had been saying on the stump when he “learned a few days ago that he was one of the two former navy seals killed in Benghazi, it broke my heart.”
Romney mentioned Doherty went to the “attack” instead of hunkering down and “that’s what Americans do, when there’s a challenge, there’s a threat, we go there.”
Barbara Doherty, Glen’s mother, told WHDH Boston that it was “wrong to use these brave young men, who wanted freedom for all, to degrade Obama.”
“I don’t trust Romney,” she said. “He shouldn’t make my son’s death part of his political agenda.”
Elf Ellefsen, Doherty’s friend, told the radio station that Romney had “used the private gathering as basically a political venture to further his image” and “Glen just believed it to be very insincere and stale.”
The Romney campaign first told the liberal website Buzzfeed about Romney’s decision to remove the story from his stump speech.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.