Plenty of conservatives are concerned over Donald Trump’s proclamation that he’s not opposed to a raise in the minimum wage. Over the weekend Trump seemed to go back on his position during the primary season that in some cases, the minimum wage was “too high,” and he stated he thinks the states should be able to determine the wage themselves: (WaPo)

“I have seen what’s going on, and I don’t know how people make it on $7.25,” said Trump on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” referencing the federal minimum hourly wage. “With that being said, I would like to see an increase of some magnitude, but I’d rather leave it to the states. Let the states decide.”

This is kind of a “nothing-burger” in the grand scheme of things. “Let the states decide” sounds like a pretty good Republican stance to me., I wish Trump had also said that raising the minimum wage kills jobs and ends up hurting the people it’s meant to help, but he didn’t.

But that hasn’t stopped people who are inclined to oppose Trump for a whole host of reasons to jump on this as another reason why Trump can’t be trusted. Many of those same Republicans and conservative then point to a potential third-party run by Mitt Romney as the remedy for the current state of the GOP.

Allahpundit detailed how Romney is fast becoming a choice for conservatives vexed by the Trump/Hillary binary option. The WaPo report on a meeting between Bill Kristol and Romney focusing on a potential third party run claims “many top conservatives would appreciate having the former Massachusetts governor’s support for an independent candidate.”

Yep. Per Erick Erickson, Romney’s already been looked at by three different groups eyeing independent candidates and been judged too stale by each of them to be the face of anti-Trump conservatives. His name recognition is universal, but running a patrician establishmentarian who’s seen as the embodiment of the “old GOP” seems not so swift in the Year of Trump.

Because, you know, Romney is a reliable conservative, unlike Trump, right?

Well, since everyone seems to be lighting their hair on fire over Trump’s “reversal” on minimum wage, can I just take a moment to point out that Romney threw conservatives under the bus in March 2014 just as the arguments over minimum wage were heating up?

Here’s how Politico reported the story then: (emphasis mine)

“I, for instance, as you know, part company with many of the conservatives in my party on the issue of the minimum wage. I think we ought to raise it,” the 2012 Republican presidential nominee said. “Because frankly, our party is all about more jobs and better pay.”

Romney’s comments come after Senate Republicans rejected a vote on a Senate bill that would have increased the minimum wage to $10.10. Recently, though, former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, both of whom also ran for the Republican nomination in 2012, said they supported some increase in the minimum wage.

That’s right. Romney’s betrayal of conservative principles came immediately after GOP senators held the line and rejected a politically charged maneuver to raise the minimum wage in an election year. And Roney didn’t suggest, as any good Republican would, that he wouldn’t mandate the minimum wage from Washington DC. Nope, Romney was ready to force the issue on all states which puts him much more on the Bernie plantation and makes Trump look like Milton Friedman.