Perry Hints He’s Quitting GOP Race
In a dead-heat three-way tie almost the entire evening, Rick Santorum, Ron Paul, and Mitt Romney all averaged about 25% each of the Iowa Caucus votes, until Romney edged out as the winner, proving that Iowa Caucus voters have no strong desire to boot President Obama out of the White House, but would rather place their egos and ideology above all else. Santorum came in a close second. Ron Paul (21%) came in third, Newt Gingrich (13%) fourth, Rick Perry (10%) fifth, and Michele Bachmann (5%) sixth. Only about 123,000 Iowa Republicans bothered to vote. By comparison, in 2008, Iowa Democrats cast about 239,000 votes at the Iowa Caucuses. And Romney, placing first at 25%, is the lowest ever, eclipsing Bob Dole’s 1996 all-time low of 26%.
At 12:50 AM Wednesday morning, only five votes had separated Romney and Santorum. At 1:35 AM, Romney was winning by one vote. At 1:40, Santorum retook the lead, by four votes, with just one precinct outstanding.
Ultimately, Romney won with about an eight vote lead, as declared at 2:32 AM by the Iowa GOP Chairman.
Santorum quoted C.S. Lewis in delivering his speech, said he attended 381 town hall meetings, and added, “I survived the challenges so far by the daily grace that comes from God… for loving me, warts and all.”
Santorum touched on the Barack Obama quote that struggling Americans are bitter and “cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”
He closed mentioning his daughter with “what they call a disability” who, according to statistics Santorum quoted, say she only had a year to live when she was born.
2008 Republican nominee Senator John McCain is expected to endorse Mitt Romney Wednesday, ensuring a New Hampshire win for Romney.
Romney, delivering the final speech of the evening, acknowledged n one yet knew who had won, but graciously congratulated Santorum for his surprise showing.
Santorum, who spent more than 100 days knocking on the thousands of doors he visited in a borrowed pick-up truck, won second-place on a shoe-string budget, having never reached front-runner status. As everyone knows, Santorum has neither the infrastructure nor the fund-raising ability, nor the likeability to wage a nationwide race successfully.
Early in the evening, Iowa Republican Congressman Steve King told NBC’s Andrea Mitchell that Michele Bachmann drove her campaign through her sheer will, strongly suggesting she, along with Rick Perry, would drop out Wednesday morning. King called Santorum’s old-fashioned retail politics “the Rick Santorum method,” warning that in the future, “Democrats and Republicans will be out here running the Rick Santorum method.” King said Santorum has raised the bar of Iowa Caucus voters’ expectations.
In his concession speech, Rick Perry, taking two small counties and a mere 10% of the vote, said he was returning home to Texas, where he would “re-assess” his campaign. He is expected to pull out shortly.
Former Bush 43 Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said Newt Gingrich’s concession speech was “the most ungracious moment” he’s ever seen in politics. And Democratic political consultant James Carville called Rick Perry the “worst candidate in American political history.”
Santorum had been the butt of jokes in social media circles all night long, even from politicos like Jonathan Alter, who retweeted Paul Begala’s response to his comment, “If Santorum pulls this out, he’ll dog Romney for months.†Begala replied, “That would be dog-on-man, no?,” alluding to Santorum’s iconic comments against same-sex marriage:
“In every society, the definition of marriage has not ever to my knowledge included homosexuality. That’s not to pick on homosexuality. It’s not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be.”
Saying the people of Iowa have spoken, Bachmann’s concession speech indicated she would not drop out, despite the AP reporting her campaign manager wasn’t sure she would stay in. CNN’s John King noted that the people of Iowa, where Bachmann grew up but did not carry a single county did, in fact speak, loudly. Four months ago, Michele Bachmann placed first in the Iowa straw poll, with 28%. Tonight, she placed last, with 5%.
Politico notes:
Reflecting the general tone of tonight’s press coverage, the New York Times is already casting the story as a victory for Santorum, who “spoiled” Romney’s quest to lock down the nomination early “by winning over conservatives who remain skeptical of Mr. Romney,” according to Jeff Zeleny. (One piece of data working in Santorum’s favor, noted by one Michael Li, is that Santorum spent $1.65 per vote in Iowa, whereas Romney spent $113.07.)
Talking Points Memo founder Josh Marshall wrote, late in the evening, “the entire Republican establishment is going to be coming out in the next couple days to shut this down and say it’s Romney … The avalanche of attempted GOP establishment coronation will be one of the big things to watch over the coming days. Can they pull it off? Probably so. But now it’s from a footing of relative weakness.” marshall adde that Gingrich now “has a new goal in this campaign, maybe in life: hurt Mitt Romney. That’s dangerous for Romney. There are more debates coming. Newt’s good at debates. And reporters love drama. That’s hazardous for Romney.”
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