Mitt Romney, (born March 12, 1947, Detroit, Mich., U.S.), U.S. businessman and politician. He was born into one of the most prominent families within the Mormon faith. After graduating from Brigham Young University (B.A., 1971), he earned a master’s degree and a law degree from Harvard University (1975). He spent most of the next 20 years with the Boston-based consulting firm Bain & Company and with its investment-focused spin-off, Bain Capital. After his successful turnaround of the scandal-plagued 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Romney was elected governor of Massachusetts. After serving one term (2003–07), he unsuccessfully ran for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008. Four years later Romney won the party’s nomination, but he was defeated in the election by Pres. Barack Obama. Romney was a critic of fellow Republican Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential election, which Trump won. In 2018 Romney was elected to represent Utah in the U.S. Senate. In 2020 he was the only Republican senator to vote to convict Trump, on one of two charges, during Trump’s first impeachment trial. Romney announced in 2023 that he would not seek reelection to the Senate in 2024.
