Romney supporters hit Gingrich over Freddie Mac

NEW YORK,Jan24 2012(AFP):Branding Gingrich “an influence peddler,” former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty said the delay in releasing details of his work for the government-backed institution undermined his credibility. “One of the things we’re asking... is that he release his contract,” Pawlenty said in a conference call. “What we don’t know and what remains a mystery is what did he do?” Gingrich, a former speaker of the House of Representatives, earned at least $1.6 million over nine years in consulting fees from Freddie Mac. Gingrich says he provided services as a trained historian, but his links to the lender are controversial because of Freddie Mac’s role in the nationwide real estate market crisis at the heart of the 2008 financial meltdown. The Romney campaign is using the issue to try to puncture Gingrich’s surprise surge in the polls. It also counters attacks by Gingrich on Romney’s own delay in releasing his tax returns, which the former Massachusetts governor says will come out Tuesday. The housing crisis was especially acute in Florida, where Romney and Gingrich go toe-to-toe in an important primary vote next week. On Monday, Gingrich said he also wanted the contract to be made public, although he did not know when this would happen. “I think it would be very helpful, and our attorneys are talking with the company,” Gingrich said on ABC’s Good Morning America. “You know I left the company, so it’s their decision, and Nancy Desmond, the president of the company, has to make the decision. But I’d be very comfortable releasing them,” he said. But in the Romney campaign’s conference call, Will Weatherford, the speaker designate of the Florida’s assembly’s house, accused Gingrich of dragging his feet. “It’s time for speaker Gingrich to come clean, it’s time to show transparency.” Pawlenty said “the notion he was paid $1.7 million as a historian by Freddie Mac is just B.S.” The two senior Republicans also voiced what analysts say is wider concern among the party establishment that Gingrich, while increasingly popular with the rank-and-file, is too divisive and unpredictable to take on President Barack Obama in a general election this November. “One of the things that I would urge conservatives and Republicans to consider is: are we going to nominate somebody who can actually win the election? Otherwise, it’s just a debating society,” Pawlenty said. Weatherford said if big name Republicans were “not jumping on the bus, we have to ask ourselves why?” Supporters of Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Monday pressured rival Newt Gingrich to make public his consulting contract with mortgage giant Freddie Mac.