Romney says he is pretty happy with his record.

Question: What do you make of Giuliani’s critique of your economic and health care records?

Mitt Romney: Gosh, I’m pretty happy with my record. Mayor Giuliani better pay more attention to his own. As a matter of fact let’s compare our financial matters. When Mayor Giuliani left the city of New York, he left it with a $3 billion budget deficit. And the new Mayor, Mayor Bloomberg, said it was an economic crisis he would never leave to his successor. In my case, when I left my office, I left a $2 billion rainy day fund for the governor that followed me, and a $500 million surplus in the last budget year. So I’m pretty proud of what I did financially. The other was healthcare. And you know I think I’m the only governor in America – frankly the only politician in America, along with my friends here in Massachusetts that found a way to bring down the cost of health insurance – the premiums of health insurance – to get everybody insured with free market insurance. Those that haven’t been insured now get free market insurance. And finally to do so without raising taxes or having the government take over health care. So what I did has begun a bit of a national revolution relating to health care. I’m proud of what I accomplished. I think you’re gonna see a number of other states following suit. And my national plan would put into place the ability of every American to have affordable insurance they couldn’t lose. It’s portable. It’s theirs. It’s not owned by their company, and it’s something which I think will change . . . help change the health care system in this country.

Recorded on: 11/26/07