Saturday, January 21, 2012
Upset: Gingrich Win In S.C. Upends GOP Race : NPR
The race for the Republican nomination has taken another surprising turn.
NPR is projecting that former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has won the South Carolina primary.
That means each of the three nominating contests held so far has had a different winner. But it's clear that Gingrich has emerged as the most serious threat to the hopes of Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor.
"Quite honestly, at the beginning of the process, I wouldn't have given Gingrich a chance," says Scott Huffmon, a pollster associated with Winthrop University in Rock Hill, S.C.
"What I underestimated was the anger of the electorate," Huffmon says. "He tapped into that near-perfectly in the last two debates."
Gingrich's Resurrection
The results in South Carolina Saturday represent an amazing comeback for Gingrich. His campaign appeared moribund last June, when the bulk of his campaign staff quit en masse.
He leapt to the top of the polls in November, only to have his support seriously eroded by a volley of attack ads launched by a superPAC supporting Romney.
Gingrich finished a distant fourth in both the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation primary. But his pugnacious performances in the two South Carolina debates this week served to energize many South Carolina conservatives.
"We had poll data every night and Romney was ahead every night until Tuesday," says David Woodard of Clemson University, referring to Clemson's Palmetto Poll. "That clearly had to be the debate (Monday)."
Indeed, the AP reports that about half of South Carolina voters surveyed in exit polls on Saturday said the debates played a "major role" in their decision-making.
The standing ovation Gingrich won at the debate on Monday was unprecedented in the memory of most longtime political observers. But he repeated the trick on Thursday, winning over the crowd with his attack on debate moderator John King of CNN for asking him about complaints lodged by one of his ex-wives that he had asked for an open marriage.
Gingrich received another gift on Thursday, when Texas Gov. Rick Perry dropped out of the race and endorsed him.
Anti-Romney Forces
Just a few days ago, it looked as if Romney would easily prevail in South Carolina, raising hopes that he could seal the nomination early.
That didn't happen. It appears that the anti-Romney vote — which has bounced in past months from candidate to candidate or been divided into several small pieces — has coalesced behind Gingrich, the former House speaker.
"One of the things the South Carolina contest has done is produce some unification of the anti-Romney conservatives," says Jim Guth, a political scientist at Furman University in Greenville, S.C.
Romney had been able to slough off complaints from Gingrich that, as chief of Bain Capital, he had been responsible for thousands of people losing their jobs.
But Romney's personal finances proved to be a more salient issue. His refusal to release his income tax returns and revelations that millions of his own dollars have been invested offshore have been troubling to some voters, Guth says.
"They raised some doubts and gave a lot of marginal Romney people reason for thinking about some of the other candidates," Guth says. "One way or the other, those things haven't helped."
The Road Ahead
Romney has enjoyed a sizable lead in polls in Florida, which will be the next state to vote on Jan. 31. But that lead — like his advantage in South Carolina — could evaporate quickly. The race has remained remarkably fluid.
Many observers believe that Romney has the organization – and the money – to prevail over the course of what may be a long nomination fight that will quickly spread to many more states.
Romney also plans to push back hard against Gingrich, calling on him to explain his consulting work for mortgage giant Freddie Mac. On Saturday, Romney's campaign sent a cake to Gingrich's South Carolina headquarters to mark the 15th anniversary of the House vote reprimanding Gingrich for ethical violations.
But Gingrich's surge has dashed Romney's hopes for a quick and easy ride to the nomination.
"The main thing South Carolina means is that Romney can't win a base red Republican state," says Woodard, the Clemson political scientist. "If he goes on to win the nomination, you've got to say that South Carolina was just a blip. But the question remains, how well is Romney going to do with the base?"
Those Also Running
Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum received some good news late Friday, when the Iowa Republican Party declared him the official winner of GOP caucuses there on Jan. 3. Initial results had shown Romney the leader with an 8-vote margin.
But Santorum hasn't been able to capitalize on the fact that he was able to come from the back of the pack to tie Romney in the year's first contest. He finished fifth in New Hampshire and, despite having won the support of a group of prominent evangelical leaders last weekend.
"Endorsements just don't matter unless they can be backed up with some money," says Woodard, who is a GOP consultant but not working for any of the presidential hopefuls.
There is already speculation that Santorum may drop out of the race if he finishes poorly in South Carolina. But he has vowed to press on.
The fourth remaining candidate, Texas Rep. Ron Paul, showed in both Iowa and New Hampshire that he has attracted a committed core of supporters that is much larger than during his previous run in 2008.
But most Republican observers believe that the same issues that have won Paul many fans — including an almost isolationist approach to foreign policy — put a ceiling on the amount of support he can attract.
Paul Looks Past South Carolina To Caucus States | Fox News
GREENVILLE, S.C. – Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul is already looking past the South Carolina primary with plans to make the most of a few states that could be more receptive to his libertarian, Internet-driven message.
Paul campaigned across seven South Carolina cities the day before Saturday's first-in-the-South primary, flying to a series of rallies in airports to tell voters he hopes his support for limited government and greater personal freedom will resonate in their state.
Romney-Gingrich showdown in S.C. - CBS News
(CBS News)CHARLESTON, S.C. -- Since 1980, the winner of South Carolina's Republican presidential primary has gone on to win the GOP nomination. So what happens here today carries considerable weight.
If you follow the polls, the race is up for grabs here.
On the one hand, you have a resurgent Newt Gingrich, who said at one rally on primary eve, "If every conservative of this state decided to vote for Newt Gingrich, we would win a shockingly big victory tomorrow."
On the other hand, there's a realistic -sounding Mitt Romney, who told supporters yesterday, "I think I said from the very beginning South Carolina is an uphill battle for a guy from Massachusetts. I knew that we're battling hard."