DeMoss, a public relations executive who also backed Romney in 2008, offered an impassioned case for the former Massachusetts governor but also took some barely-veiled swipes at Mike Huckabee and Sarah Palin.

“Those who would suggest I am placing values on the back burner will be misreading me and wrong,” he wrote. “I am only saying that a candidate’s values alone are not enough to get my vote. For example, my pastor shares my values, but I don’t want him to be my president. (By the way, ‘energizing a crowd’ is also not enough; Justin Bieber can do that—but I don’t want him to be president either.)”