Mary Matalin: Romney has 'heart and soul' of an average American

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney may have a net worth of a quarter of a billion dollars, but he has the "heart and soul" of an average American, according to GOP strategist Mary Matalin.

ABC host George Stephanopolous on Sunday asked Matalin how serious a problem Romney's immense wealth would be as the campaign goes forward.

"You know, one thing he needs to do is quit being defensive about it," Matalin explained. "This is an aspirational country. His first calculation to be defensive about it is why he keeps getting stuck in it. When he says, 'I'm an American success story and Bain [Capital] is an American success story' -- and he should pivot to: 'If we had less of a regulatory and a tax labyrinth, you could be an American success story too.' I think he will get there because he is."

She added: "He has the heart and soul -- and his family does -- of an average American family."

Throughout his campaign, Romney, who is worth around $250 million, has made a series of tone-deaf attempts to relate to average Americans.

In June, he in Florida that he was “also unemployed.”

Returning to Florida in September, the candidate claimed that he was .

Romney told a group of workers at a steel plant in November that federal employees made more than he did. He has also said that he knows “what it’s like to worry whether you’re going to get fired.”

During a January debate in South Carolina, Romney encouraged voters to send him to Washington because he had “lived in the real streets of America.”

During an interview on Fox News earlier this month, the candidate's wife, Ann Romney, said that she didn't think of herself as a wealthy person.

"So, you know, we can be poor in spirit," she told told Fox News host Neil Cavuto. "I don’t look — I don’t even consider myself wealthy, which is an interesting thing. It can be here today and gone tomorrow. And how I measure riches is by the friends I have and the loved ones I have and the people that I care about in my life. And that’s where my values are and that where my riches are."

Watch this video from ABC's This Week, broadcast March. 11, 2012.