The tiniest of margins -- eight votes -- elevated front-runner Mitt Romney over dark horse Rick Santorum in the Iowa caucuses Tuesday night, with Ron Paul finishing third in the opening contest for the GOP presidential nomination.
The chairman of the Iowa Republican Party, Matt Strawn, made the
announcement of the razor-thin margin from Des Moines in the early hours of
Wednesday morning.
Strawn said Romney got 30,015 votes and Santorum received 30,007 votes.
"Game on!" declared Santorum as the final votes were being counted.
The big losers Tuesday were Newt Gingrich in fourth, Rick Perry in fifth
and Michele Bachmann in sixth. All face daunting obstacles moving ahead. Perry
said he is now reassessing his candidacy.
While Iowa doesn't always vote for the eventual Republican nominee, it
invariably winnows the field.
All three of the top vote-getters had something to crow about Tuesday in
a volatile, topsy-turvy campaign.
Santorum, the former Pennsylvania senator, vaulted to sudden relevance,
outperforming his rivals among evangelical and born-again Christians, as well
as the most conservative voters. He faces major challenges in ramping up his
organization for a national campaign, but he has injected a new dynamic into
the race.
Romney, the former Massachusetts governor and 2008 presidential
candidate, survived a potentially perilous contest with his front-runner
status and image of inevitability still largely intact. He remains in a
commanding position in the nominating fight, but will continue to face
questions about his appeal to the party's conservative base. He ran especially
well among older and higher-income voters.
Romney congratulated both Santorum and Paul Tuesday and bashed President
Obama as a "nice guy" who is "just in over his head."
Paul, the 76-year-old congressman from Texas, may have ensured for
himself and his libertarian views a bigger platform in a campaign few expect
him to win. He dominated Tuesday among youn ger voters, independents and
first-time caucus-goers.
He called it a "fantastic showing."
With more than 95% of the voting complete, Santorum and Romney each had
25%, Paul had 21%, Gingrich had 13%, Perry had 10% and Bachmann had 5%.
The next contests are Jan. 10 in New Hampshire, where Romney has enjoyed
a big lead in the polls, and Jan. 21 in South Carolina, where his rivals on
the right may have their best shot at slowing him down.
Tuesday's outcome reinforced the major patterns of the Republican race so
far: Romney as the "constant" in the campaign, his performance solid and
steady but unspectacular (his share of the Iowa vote this year was almost
identical to what it was four years ago); and the perpetual turbulence of the
rest of the field, with candidates soaring and sinking and trading places.
Santorum won Tuesday among late-deciding voters.
"People are looking for the least offensive person," said Lisa Wieskamp,
who saw Santorum at the Des Moines Christian School Tuesday. "I don't know if
anyone has really distinguished themselves from the pack. Santorum has done a
better job than the others lately."
Judged one way, Romney couldn't have scripted a more trouble-free course
through the Iowa caucuses, whose big bloc of Christian conservatives posed a
