Tales from the Trail

Republican Newt Gingrich had not heard of a controversy surrounding some of the final actions of rival Mitt Romney’s staff when Romney was governor of Massachusetts, but suggested the ploy might even turn up in one of his books in the future.

The Boston Globe reported this week that when Romney was leaving the statehouse in 2006 after one term as governor, eleven of his staff were allowed to use their own money to purchase their work computers’ hard drives, and the Romney administration’s emails were all wiped from a server.

“They did what?” Gingrich said when asked about it at a press conference in Cambridge, Massachusetts, after a film screening. “I’m now in non-candidate mode, of simply being curious as a citizen.”

Gingrich said he had “no idea” what Romney or his staff might have hoped to achieve, adding, “you should ask him that.”

“As a novelist, by the way, it’s a lot of fun,” he added.

Romney, campaigning in New Hampshire on Friday, said he and his staff “followed the law as intended and as written.”

President Barack Obama, on a campaigning blitz for fellow Democrats facing tough fights to stay in office, or get there, is trying to tie the state races to national issues to convince voters their ballot will have a broader impact.

“People on Capitol Hill, they watch the news,” he said.

On Wednesday, the president flew to New Jersey for a rally backing Governor Jon Corzine, who only just climbed into a tie with his Republican opponent, according to opinion polls.

Corzine is struggling in his bid for re-election Nov. 3, although New Jersey is a heavily Democratic state.

If history and emotion are any indication, Democrats seem certain to retain Edward Kennedy’s  Senate seat, which the Massachusetts liberal held for nearly a half century before succumbing last week to brain cancer.

Political analysts note that Massachusetts has traditionally voted Democratic, including in last year’s U.S. presidential election. The last time Massachusetts elected a Republican to the Senate was 1972 when it gave Edward Brooke a second six-year term.

Analysts also point out that Kennedy’s death created a tidal wave of emotion, one that his party will likely ride to victory in a special election to replace him.