Gingrich savours win over Romney

Buoyant Newt Gingrich headed to Florida today for the next stage of the race to choose a Republican challenger to Barack Obama, following his shock victory over rival Mitt Romney.

Meanwhile Mr Romney will be looking to reset his once front-running campaign with an attack on his chief rival’s character.

Mr Romney is making his second run for the Republican presidential nomination, this time to unseat Mr Obama in the November election. But the former Massachusetts governor has failed so far to excite broad support from an increasingly conservative Republican electorate.

Mr Obama, while still popular personally, is battling weak approval ratings for his leadership in pulling the US economy out of the ravages of the 2007-2009 Great Recession. About 8.5% of American workers remain unemployed, millions have lost homes to mortgage repossessions and the overall economy, while improving in recent months, remains wobbly.

Mr Gingrich said he owed his stunning victory in South Carolina’s primary election yesterday to proving that he spoke the political language of deeply conservative voters. He won points, too, for his attacks on Mr Romney’s moderate past on social issues like abortion, gay rights and healthcare reform.

And evangelical Christians in South Carolina chose to overlook Mr Gingrich’s history: three marriages, admitted infidelities and an ethics reprimand when he was the speaker of the House of Representatives in the mid-1990s.

Mr Romney turns to Florida at what is possibly the most critical moment of his campaign. He has suffered two weeks of sustained attacks from his opponents and a series of self-inflicted errors that erased any notion that he would be able to lock up the nomination quickly by winning the state’s January 31 primary.

An indication of how deeply he has been shaken was his announcement yesterday that he would release his income tax records for 2010 and estimates for 2011 tomorrow.

For weeks, multi-millionaire Mr Romney had been reluctant to let voters see his tax filings, which would not only show how much he earns, but that he probably pays a lower tax rate than ordinary wage earners because much of his income is derived from capital gains on investments.

Mr Romney was an easy winner in the New Hampshire primary earlier in the month. Before that, he was a very close runner-up behind former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum in the lead-off Iowa caucuses where the vote count was so confused that he was originally announced the victor.

Mr Romney led by double digits in polls of South Carolina Republicans a week before the primary. But Mr Gingrich surged into the lead following strong performances in two debates last week. Now Mr Romney acknowledges that his battle with Mr Gingrich is likely to stretch out into the spring, if not longer.

“I’m looking forward to a long campaign,” Mr Romney said. “We are selecting the president of the United States. Someone who is going to face ups and downs and real challenges, and I hope that through this process, I can demonstrate that I can take a setback and come back strong.”

Despite his loss in South Carolina, Mr Romney remains the contender with the largest and best-funded organisation to sustain an extended campaign. For all the political momentum gained in South Carolina, Mr Gingrich made it immediately obvious in his victory speech that he was short on funds.

Behind the scenes, aides indicated that Mr Romney would focus on Mr Gingrich’s character to distinguish himself, the father of five who has been married to the same woman for 42 years, from his thrice-married rival.

And the aides argue that the results in South Carolina do not indicate Republican primary voters everywhere are willing to overlook Mr Gingrich’s past.

Mr Gingrich’s second wife, Marianne, told ABC News in an interview that he asked her for an open marriage so he could continue having an affair with the House staffer who is now his third wife.

But the emboldened Mr Gingrich said his hardline conservative views and confrontational style would be needed to stand up to Mr Obama’s “billion-dollar war chest” and take back the White House.

In several televised interviews, Mr Gingrich said Mr Romney was a moderate who left Republican voters cold and that only he could go “toe to toe” with Mr Obama.

“I think in South Carolina it began to become really clear that if you want to beat Barack Obama, then Newt Gingrich is the only person who has the background, the experience and the ability to get on the stage and drive home a conservative message with authenticity,” he said.

With votes counted from all of South Carolina’s precincts, Mr Gingrich had 40% to Mr Romney’s 28%. Mr Santorum won 17% to Texas congressman Ron Paul’s 13%.

Mr Gingrich won at least 23 of the 25 delegates at stake. The other two have yet to be allocated. Fifty delegates will be at stake in Florida.

All four remaining candidates planned to be Florida today for the first of two presidential debates this week.