Win Mcnamee / Getty Images
Supporters of Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney celebrate during a Super Tuesday event at the Westin Copley Place March 6, 2012 in Boston.
By Michael O'Brien, msnbc.com
?
Updated?10:52 p.m. ET ? A hard-fought battle between Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum in Ohio yielded no quick winner in the state, the prize contest on Super Tuesday that could reshape the battle for the Republican presidential nomination.
Both Romney and Santorum notched victories across the country in the caucuses and primaries they had been expected to win. Newt Gingrich won the primary in Georgia, the state from which he had served as a representative in Congress, but trailed in the remainder of states playing host to nominating contests on Tuesday.
But the trajectory of the Republican campaign hinged in large part on Ohio, where Romney and Santorum re-litigated their battle from just a week earlier in Michigan's primary, where the former eked out a victory. Santorum had looked to the state to validate his status as the chief conservative opponent to Romney.
A margin of just a few thousand votes separated?Santorum and Romney after most votes had been counted, although a number of major precincts had yet to report their results. NBC News declared the race in Ohio "too close to call."
NBC's David Gregory and Savannah Guthrie discuss the latest Super Tuesday results in the GOP presidential nominations which hinges on a close race in Ohio.
NBC separately projected Romney as the winner in Vermont, Massachusetts and Virginia (where only he and Texas Rep. Ron Paul appeared on the ballot).
"There are three states under our belt, and counting. We're going to get more by the time this night is over," Romney told supporters in Boston before firmly declaring: "I'm going to get this nomination."
Santorum was projected to win in Oklahoma, North Dakota and Tennessee, the latter of which had become a tighter battle in the days preceding Super Tuesday. The former Pennsylvania senator, in remarks preceding a final call in Ohio, claimed new energy to fight on with his campaign.
"We're going to win a few, we're going to lose a few. But as it looks right now, we're going to get at least a couple gold medals and a whole bassel full of silver medals," Santorum said in Steubenville, Ohio, before the state's results were announced. "We have won in the West and the Midwest and the South, and we're ready to win across this country."
Today's contests -- 11 states, in total, allotted delegates on Tuesday -- served as an inflection point in a primary defined in large part by each of the Republican candidates' struggle to gain a foothold within the party.
More delegates were up for grabs on this Super Tuesday than had been previously allocated to the remaining GOP candidates after two months of voting, according to NBC News projections. Between the 10 states holding primaries or caucuses and Wyoming, which will allocate five of its 26 delegates, a total of 424 of the 1,144 delegates needed to win the nomination are at stake.
Mitt Romney tells a Super Tuesday crowd of supporters that the country can't afford four more years of Barack Obama with no one to answer to.
The eleven states in which delegates were at stake on Tuesday were Georgia, Virginia, Vermont, North Dakota, Ohio, Massachusetts, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Idaho, Alaska and Wyoming.
Romney was expected to emerge as the night's winner in terms of delegate haul, a point which he emphasized in his speech.
"Tonight we're doing some counting," he said. "We're counting the delegates for the convention and that looks good, and we're counting down the days to the convention, and that looks better."
But neither Santorum nor Gingrich seemed discouraged from pushing forward with their campaigns, reflecting the lingering doubts by Romney among conservatives, which were underscored in exit polling.
Romney continued to struggle with the most conservative voters, the core of the Republican Party, in states like Ohio and Tennessee -- arguably the two most competitive contests held Tuesday. But Romney also performed well among voters who consider the economy their top issue, or who rated a candidate's ability to beat President Obama in November -- two key selling points in the former Massachusetts governor's campaign.
Some Republicans had hoped that Super Tuesday would help propel the Republican race into a new stage, one that draws toward a conclusion given the growing negative cloud surrounding the GOP race.
Forty percent of respondents, for instance, said in Monday's NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll that the primary process has given them a less favorable opinion of the Republican Party. And more independent voters said in a separate Washington Post/Pew Research Center poll that their impression of the GOP candidates was getting worse as a result of the primary than those who said their opinion was improving.
A strong performance by Romney might have moved more Republicans who had harbored doubts about the ex-governor off the fence, and finally create some sustained momentum for Romney. Still, momentum in the primary has come in fits and starts, threatening to make the Republican campaign into a prolonged battle over delegates.
After victories in Oklahoma and Tennessee, Rick Santorum expresses optimism as he addresses supporters at a rally in Ohio, saying that he and his family are "making a sacrifice for a very big goal," replacing President Barack Obama.
According to NBC News projections, Romney picked up at least 90 delegates as of late Tuesday evening, while Santorum claimed 37 and Gingrich won 48.
"I feel good about how things have evolved in the last six months," Obama campaign adviser said Tuesday evening on NBC. "They are decimating each other ... independent voters are fleeing them."
keystone xl pipeline idaho potato bowl cagayan de oro cagayan de oro bowl schedule 2011 bowl schedule barry bonds
No comments:
Post a Comment