THE GUARDIAN: Pressure piles on Newt Gingrich to quit as Rick Santorum takes Mississippi and Alabama, with Mitt Romney trailing third
Rick Santorum has made a clean sweep of the Deep South primaries, taking Mississippi and Alabama in victories that put pressure on Newt Gingrich to bow out and set up a showdown in Illinois next week with the struggling favourite, Mitt Romney.
Gingrich came second, with Romney third and Ron Paul a distant fourth. Although Gingrich vowed to carry on, if he cannot win Mississippi or Alabama, he has little chance of winning anywhere else. He goes to Chicago for a fund-raising event on Wednesday and is likely also to hold a post-mortem with his backers to discuss the viability of fighting on.
If Gingrich bows out and the conservative vote rallies around Santorum, he would be well placed to take on Romney in Illinois, one of the biggest states in contention.
Santorum, at an election party in Louisiana, one of the upcoming contests, said there was nothing inevitable about Romney winning the Republican nomination to take on Barack Obama in November, even with all the millions of dollars behind him.
"For someone who thinks this race is inevitable, he spent a whole lot of money against me for someone who is inevitable," Santorum said.
Invoking his faith right at the start of his speech, he said: "I want to thank God for giving us the strength every day to go out there." » | Ewen MacAskill | Wednesday, March 14, 2012
