Romney used Olympics for political gain, article says

A different take:  » The Making of Mitt Romney — Part 5: The Olympian — Article from The Boston Globe  » Series link — Special report from The Boston Globe

The most recent installment Thursday in a weeklong Boston Globe series on GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney focuses on his effort to use his leadership of Salt Lake City's 2002 Winter Olympics to further his political ambitions.

The lengthy front-page article, which is accompanied on the newspaper's Web site by a video featuring interviews with both local supporters and critics of Romney's running of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee, concluded he benefited from his time in Utah.

The Olympics, according to the Globe, "cemented Romney's reputation as a 'turnaround artist' — a manager so competent that he could turn deficits into surpluses, and who might one day be able to guide the nation."

Shortly after Salt Lake's Olympics ended, Romney left Utah for Massachusetts, where he ran successfully for governor. After his term ended at the beginning of the year, he formally entered the race for the White House.

Romney, who took over the Games after allegations surfaced that Salt Lake bidders tried to buy International Olympic Committee votes with lavish gifts and trips, "managed to remove the stink of scandal and replace it with the glow of success."

But not everyone interviewed for the article saw it quite that way.

"Mitt didn't save the Games. It was a publicity ploy from the beginning to build his platform in politics," former organizing committee leader Tom Welch told the Deseret Morning News Thursday.

Welch, who faced federal charges in connection with the bid scandal that were later dismissed, was quoted in the story as saying, "Mitt's objective was to look as good as he could. He showed a mean side as well as a competent side."

Another critic in the Globe article was Ken Bullock, a member of the organizing committee's board of trustees and the director of the Utah League of Cities and Towns. Bullock is described as Romney's chief foe.

Bullock, who said in the article that Romney "tried very hard to build an image of himself as a savior, the great white hope," told the Deseret Morning News that to say Romney "saved the Games, that's just revisionist history."

The article traces Romney's stewardship of the Olympics in detail, including the role of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which is labeled "a source of contention." The LDS Church provided downtown land used for the nightly medal ceremonies.