Romney to Retire, Hurricane Lee Prep, Ethics Entaglement
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Mitt romney has been a lonely republican voice.

I represent a small wing of the party, wise way, I believe.

I ney retiring. So what's that mean? Dont that.

Steven skip? And this is the first tremenhere r news. Kin lee is moving north in the general direction of maine.

Not many of us have ever experience ed. a.

How ready are residents in emergency crews?

And the P. R, firm, once run by a presidential adviser, apologized for a conflict of interest. The company, run by a needed done, gave helped to both sides in a case of alleged retaliation for sexual harassment out of the conflict.

Come like five years later. Stay with this. We've got the news. You need to start your day.

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In an office filled with momentous of his political career, senator mitt romney explained his reasons for ending .

IT at the end of another term. I'd be in my mid eighties. Frankly. It's time for a new generation of leaders. They are the ones that need to make the decisions that will shape the world. They will be living .

in the utah republican senator and former presidential hopefull is known as a frequent by parson negotiator and an outspoken critic. Donald, his departure as to the increasingly divisive state of american politics.

N, P, R, political editor and corresponded, demonic mountain. I was with us this morning. Good morning.

Hi Steve.

How did romney stand out among other republicans?

Well, I mean, before romney was senor from utah, you know, is a governor in a liberal state in he's a real believer in political success being tied to buy partisanship. And then, you know, even when he became a senator in a pretty conservative state, he stayed true to that by partisanship, belief that doesn't make him a liberal or even a moderate.

Now a, he's a conservative, but in trying to solve big problems, he believed in the need to work with the other side to get done. What could get done? And that really is rare, particularly now in the republican party.

It's remarkable to think that he was the republican identical nominee. The election before Donald trump was nominated, two very different people. He constantly criticized Donald trump's running for office and as president. How do you address that yesterday?

Yeah, I mean, he didn't try away from IT at all. You know, he was asked about the state of the republican party. And here's what he had to say.

There is no question. But the republican party today is in the shadow of dolch mp. He is the leader of the greatest portion of the republican party.

It's a populist, I believe, demotic portion of the party. I look, I represent a small wing of the party, if you will. I all the wise wing of the public and party. And I don't believe we're IT going away. I think ultimately will see a resurgence and come back in the leadership of the party.

Yeah, I mean, he said that he really feels like trump and some of his party don't believe in the constitution. He in a magazine interview and he believes that that reversion back to a being part of the wise wing of the republican party, as he sees IT, will be because rank and follow republican voters will eventually realize that mega is a losing strategy, that Young people in particular are repelled by IT, and that from a policy standpoint, romney says that he believes rightwing, popular m that Donald trump ed totes, you will fail because he said, paraphrased in the writer hl mankind, that to each problem there's a solution that is simple.

clear and wrong. What else did he have to say about the fitness of his fellow senators and other political leaders?

Well, he talked about his own age. You know, people may not realize romney is seventy six years old. I mean, I hope I look in talk as well as he does when i'm pushing eighty.

But he noted, you know, that he would be in his eighties at the end of his next term and feels that it's really the next generation that needs to step up and address the problems that are gonna on their plate rather than boomers who, as you put IT, have put in a place a lot of these programs but haven't paid for a lot of them overall. Really seemed like a man relieved, quoting slaps to comedy. For example, when asked if if he's going to run ever again, he referred to the midd ninety jim carrey movie dum and dummer. There's a million to one shot. So you're saying there's a chance.

vida montano, thanks so much are welcome.

Preparations runaway in parts of the north eastern united states as hurricane lee makes its way north of the atlantic coast.

Yeah, parts of main are under a hurricane watch in the storm is expected to mic landfall there this weekend. Residents in main in a nearby states are preparing for what could be dangerous conditions in significant damage or regional, already battered by flooding .

and extreme weather. Mp tobia Smith is covering all this from boston.

Hatoon a good morning.

Still okay. For people in florida, this is Normal. For people in north CarOlina, and this is Normal. What about where you are?

No, not so much. You know, we hardly new englanders, tend to drive through our winter north and several feet to snow. You like to see now, just another day, but these hurricanes so much, we do see some relatively weaker tropical storms come overland.

But the last category won hurricane to come from the sea and make landfall in men was more than a half century ago. And that's because cooler ocean temperature here tend to weaken these storms. But this one is being fuelled by waters that are warmer than Normal. I spoke with sera thurber's with the national weather service and mine. She's one of many extra media oroya st called into work.

Not many of us have ever experiences the hurricane pears. So um all of us are getting excited about the weather aspects and we can actually see some of the stuff that we went to school for. But then um this is also our community and so we really are trying to stay focused on making sure that everyone is able to get the right information to stay.

How does what the leading up to this complicate the situation?

Yeah, as Steve, this has been one of the west summers on record, including serious summer flooding in vermont, for example, in this week's massive flooding and massive chooses, that brought around ten inches in just about six hours, and that caused catastrophic damage. So now folks are bracing for even more rain and wind that's gonna a compound the chAllenges ah because when the ground is already saturated, flooding is more likely and trees are more prone to come down and to take power lines with them of the nesa. Corson is with the main emergency management agency, and he says residents may be without power for this.

because if the winds are thirty five miles per hour or higher sustained, they will not send people out in bucket trucks, so people need to be prepared. They may be without electricity until the crews are safe to go up and make those repairs could be seventy two hours. We hope it's not that long, but you just never know.

So right now, folks are heating the warnings, stocking up on food and batteries .

for the storms. You said that cooler ocean temperatures of north tend to protect new england from hurricanes. Is that barrier eroding as climate change, warmth, the planet?

Yeah, that's certainly how a many see IT, including massachuset governor, more a healing who said this week, i'm perthes ing here, but he said, we're seeing things every day that we've never seen before. So from this hurricane watching man to the warnings of life threatening storm surge, flooding on cape cotton and ticket, this is looking to be a damaging storm and a massive one. So Steve all just add that even where this doesn't make landfall, hurricane force and tropical storm force winds may stretch two hundred plus miles from the center of the storm, again threatening serious .

damage to via. Thanks so much for your reporting. Thank you, Steve. That's envious. Topia smooths in boston.

Evidence from a federal trial in chicago revealed an apparent conflict of interest for a needed done, who is now a top advisor .

inside the I advise one has a public, and her company advised both sides in a sexual harassment and scandal. Her company gave advice to an illini politician who was accused, and IT also supported the woman who first brought the claim of harassment and retaliation. I'm in response to this replay done firm has apologize in paris.

Tom drive box is covering the story time. Good morning.

Good morning.

How did this incident from several years ago come to light?

Well, as evidence came out during an unrelated corruption trial in chicago. And let's just say up front, that investigators have not suggested any wrongdoing at all, but I need to done in connection with that corruption case. But for almost a decade, the justice department has been investigating one of the most powerful men in illini politics, former state house speaker Michael madigan, and in twenty eighteen, he was sued not for harassment himself, but for allegedly retaliating against the woman who was sexually harassed. Now at the time, madigan associated discussed how to respond, and the FBI was listening in on a wiretap.

So we finally hard to crisis. Different, different company. I need a done. I need a done. D, U, N, N.

Madigan hired a needed done and her public relations from S, K, D, K. To provide crisis communications.

which people do in a situation like this. So what was wrong with that?

While the same time as dance firm S K decade was working for madgin, they were also partnered with the anti harassment charity times up legal defense fund in sk decay and the times of legal defense fund were supporting the woman who had sued Michael madigan. Her name is elena.

Okay, so I needed done. And her firm, S, K, D, K, we're essentially working with both sides.

That's right. They were working for the defendant madigan. At the same time, they were supporting the plaintive.

Did they disclose that to elena hampton?

Hampton told me they never disclosed that to her, and he never would have worked with them if he had known at the time of her lawsuit. SHE was twenty eight years old going against argue, the most powerful politician in illinois, and the firm that he thought was helping her was also working for the other side.

He told me, I need a done specifically as an adviser to the present of the united states and to learn that he was helping advise my former employer on my retaliation case due to sexual harassment is just a clear conflict of interest. It's really a violation of trust, and IT feels like a betrayal, the times of .

legal defense fund said they also were not told that sk decay was working for the other side, and they said they share a later hamptons frustrations.

I guess we should know he was not working for the White house at the time. All these things happened years ago in two thousand and eighteen. She's running this pr. firm. But SHE is working for the White house now.

So what did he say? Well, I called her and he just told me to contact her. Old hung up S, K, D, K initially defended their work for micrometer gan and deny there was really a conflict of interest because lan, ashamed t to the primary point of contact with the firm, was a contractor, not a full time employee.

But then the following day, they sent me a revised statement and said IT was actually an error in their words to work with medicine. And they said they apologize to A A hampton. But alan and hatton told me that apology does not do enough to repair the damage done, not just to her, but he said to the me too, movement more broadly and other women dealing with these issues.

and this tom drives back.

Thanks so much. Thank you.

And that's at first for this thursday, september fourteenth. S i'm Steve and .

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