“I want to maintain defense spending at the current level of the GDP. I don’t want to keep bringing it down as the president’s doing. This sequestration idea of the White House, which is cutting our defense, I think is an extraordinary miscalculation in the wrong direction,” Romney says.

Pressed on the votes of House leaders, including Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Ryan, in favor of the deal, Romney says that was a “big mistake.”

“I thought it was a mistake on the part of the White House to propose it. I think it was a mistake for Republicans to go along with it,” he adds.