On March 3, 2016, U.S. Republican politician Mitt Romney delivered a major speech for the Hinckley Institute of Politics at the Libby Gardner Hall in the University of Utah.

Two months after the speech, Trump secured the Republican Party's presidential nomination and subsequently won the general election and became the President of the United States.

Romney viewed Trump's apparent failure to disavow former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke in a CNN interview as the final straw, and decided to speak out.

The speech, scheduled to be delivered at the University of Utah's Libby Gardner Hall and hosted by the Hinckley Institute of Politics Forum[4] was described by sources with advanced knowledge of its content as a chance to criticize Trump's progress toward the Republican Party's 2016 presidential nomination.

[7] Although Romney began the speech by expressly disavowing any intention to seek the 2016 Republican nomination himself, several media outlets theorized that the speech was intended to inject Romney back into the national discussion in an effort to introduce him as a compromise candidate during the 2016 Republican National Convention, should Trump not obtain a majority of votes on the first ballot and a contested convention result.

[8][9][10] Following the speech, online betting site PredictIt saw a spike in wagers that Romney would eventually be a candidate for president, with a seven-fold increase in oddsmaking on the prospect.

Romney used the address, a targeted critique of Donald Trump, to declare that the candidate's promises were "worthless", describe him as a "fraud", and claim that "he's playing the American public for suckers: he gets a free ride to the White House and all we get is a lousy hat."

[17] Donald Trump responded to Romney's initial press release scheduling the speech by describing it, in a post to his Twitter account, as "another desperate move by the man who should have easily beaten Barrack [sic] Obama".

[5] On March 3, the morning of the speech, Trump telephoned the Today Show and attacked Romney as a "stiff" who "failed twice" as a presidential candidate.

At a campaign rally in Portland, Maine, Trump told supporters, in reference to the 2012 presidential election, "I backed Mitt Romney.

[39] Scattered instances of Romney's proposed tactical voting occurred after this, including suggestions by Rubio shortly before March 15 results forced his withdrawal from the race.

Cruz dropped out of the presidential race that night and Kasich followed the next day, making Trump the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party.

[46] In reaction to the outcome, Romney declared that he would not support Trump, saying, "I am dismayed at where we are now, I wish we had better choices, and I keep hoping that somehow things will get better, and I just don't see an easy answer from where we are.