Romney wins Iowa GOP caucus, edges out Santorum

By Sarah Gonzalez

© Copyright Agri-Pulse Communications, Inc.



WASHINGTON, Jan. 4- Mitt Romney pulled off a win in the Iowa caucus last night by a tiny margin, with just eight more Republican caucus votes than runner-up Rick Santorum. Iowan Republicans picked the former Massachusetts governor as its preferred presidential GOP candidate last night. Both Santorum and Romney received roughly 25 percent of caucus votes. 

C-SPAN reported a record turnout with more than 122,000 Iowan voters in the caucus, surpassing the 2008 total. According to the Iowa Republican Party, votes completed with 30,015 votes for Romney and 30,007 for Santorum.

Chairman of the Republican Party of Iowa, Matt Strong, announced the final tally after midnight, clarifying that the final, certified results will be official within two weeks.

Ron Paul ended the night in third place with approximately 22 percent of the Iowa Republican caucus votes. Newt Gingrich received 14 percent, Rick Perry wrangled 11 percent and Michele Bachman received just five percent. Jon Huntsman declined to campaign in Iowa to focus on the primary in New Hampshire and gained only a few hundred Iowan votes. 

Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney is in his second presidential race. Romney is considered in various polls as the best option to beat President Obama in the next election; however, he is often criticized by GOP members as too moderate. 

Romney insists that farm subsidies are needed to safeguard the nation’s food supply and has called them a “national-security issue.” He also voiced support in the past months for ethanol subsidies as a way to kick-start the industry and indicated that he might support similar action in other potential domestic energy sources. 

During his speech after the voting results Tuesday night, Romney focused much of his energy on continuing his campaign to New Hampshire and making his case against President Obama. 

“Almost everything the President done has made it harder for businesses to grow,” Romney said.  “This has been a failed presidency. If we want to create jobs in this country, it’s going to be helpful to have someone who’s had a job in the private sector.” 

 

Santorum quickly rose in the polls over the past few days, making stops in every one of Iowa’s 99 counties and completing a total of 380 town hall meetings. 

“Ten days ago I was at four percent in the polls,” he said during one a town hall meeting in Altoona, Iowa, on Monday. “Money isn’t going to win this election. We’re going to run a campaign that continues to interact with voters.”

Earlier today, Santorum said he has not spent even $2 million on his campaign, comparing his funds to the $20-$25 million campaigns run by some other candidates. The next contest for the GOP candidates is the first primary in New Hampshire on Jan. 10. Santorum said his team is just as prepared in that state as it was in Iowa.  

“We’ve raised more money in the last week than we have in the last few months,” he said during an interview Tuesday morning with Fox and Friends. “We’re going to keep a lean machine and focus those resources on voter contact.”

Among Santorum’s policy proposals in his platform to cut $5 trillion of federal spending within five years, he suggests eliminating “all energy subsidies and most agriculture subsidies within four years,” according to the “Where I Stand: Rick Santorum for President” campaign. Other bullet points on his platform include:

-Cut EPA resources for job killing regulations and return focus to commonsense conservation and safe and clean air and water.

-Secure our border, streamline the legal immigration process to attract highly skilled talent and entrepreneurs from around the world and reform the agriculture worker program so it works for America’s farmers

-Freeze spending levels for social programs for 5 years such as Medicaid, Housing, Education, Job Training, and Food Stamps, time limit restrictions, and block grant to the States like in Welfare Reform.

-Eliminate funding for implementation of Dodd/Frank regulatory burdens.

-Approve the Keystone Pipeline and other job creating initiatives delayed and burdened excessively by government regulation

His agricultural policy-making background as a Pennsylvania senator includes approving the Milk Income Loss Contract (MILC) Program in 2005 to be extended through 2007. He introduced the MILC Extension Act in February of 2005 as a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee and a representative of one of the largest dairy producing states in the nation. 

At the beginning of the day Tuesday, Mitt Romney, Ron Paul and Rick Santorum were the three Iowa caucus front-runners in a race much too close to call. The three fought for the Iowa pick throughout the length of voting Tuesday night, with no clear victor until the last few counties reported votes. According to NPR, hours before the votes began polls indicated that more than a third of those planning to attend the caucuses had not yet made up their minds.

Texas Governor Rick Perry announced after the results Tuesday night that he would return to Texas to decide whether his campaign for President should continue. 


President Obama, who won the Iowa democratic caucus four years ago, also sent his sentiments to the Hawkeye state Tuesday via video message.

“We’ve passed health care reform; we’ve passed Wall Street reform,” he said. “But there are a lot of forces that want to push back against those changes.”

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