The Republican candidate's proposals for Arab Spring 'might be a problem,' Huntsman said. | REUTERS Huntsman: Mitt's got 'a problem'

Jon Huntsman said Friday he doesn’t know how Mitt Romney is planning to handle the Arab Spring, which the former GOP presidential hopeful said was a “kind of a problem.”

“I don’t know what Gov. Romney is proposing at this point,” Huntsman said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” when asked about the difference between how President Barack Obama would handle the Arab Spring, compared with Romney’s proposals.


“That might be a problem,” host Mika Brzezinski said.

“It’s kind of a problem,” Huntsman said.

Huntsman, who lost to Romney in the Republican primaries and half-heartedly endorsed the eventual nominee, worked for Obama as U.S. ambassador to China. He also worked in foreign policy in the George W. Bush administration before winning office in Utah.

Huntsman had earlier in the interview declined to criticize Romney’s comments in the wake of the assaults on the U.S. Embassy in Cairo and the consulate in Benghazi, Libya. Four Americans, including the ambassador, died in an attack on the Benghazi compound.

“I failed, as my daughter tells me time and time again, so I’m not in a position to offer any kind of advice,” Huntsman said, later adding: “I thought this was a perfect opportunity for the Romney campaign to step up, and begin, not through immediate criticism, but begin to articulate their vision for the Middle East, in terms of how we begin putting some of these pieces back together again. That’s what the American people want to hear. I think they’ve heard enough of the finger-pointing, the criticisms, the anger.”

And if Huntsman wanted to help Romney, he wouldn’t have the opportunity. Later Friday, MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell asked him when he last talked to the former Massachusetts governor.

“I don’t ever talk to him,” Huntsman said.