MIAMI - Sen. John McCain was projected to win Florida's Republican primary, NBC News said Tuesday night, a critical victory over Mitt Romney in the battle for momentum before the race for the GOP presidential nomination turns into a nationwide delegate struggle on Feb. 5.
With more than half of the state's 6,913 precincts reporting, McCain had 35 percent of the vote, and Romney had 31 percent. Rudy Giuliani and Mike Huckabee were running behind the leaders, struggling for survival.
A senior Giuliani campaign aide told NBC News that he wouldn't comment on a TIME Magazine report that Giuliani and McCain have struck a deal and Giuliani will endorse McCain in California, perhaps as early as Wednesday.
NBC news analyst Howard Fineman reported that the two campaigns were negotiating details of the deal.
Huckabee, speaking to supporters during a campaign stop in St. Louis on Tuesday night, said he was looking ahead to Super Tuesday, when there are 23 contests.
“We’re playing all nine innings of this ball game,” he said. The selection process is “not even close to being over. We’re just really getting started.”
Tuesday's winner stood to gain all 57 national convention delegates at stake, the biggest prize so far in an early round of primaries and caucuses.
In the Democrats' primary — a nonbinding contest in which no delegates were at stake — NBC News projected that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton would finish with more votes than her rivals. Sen. Barack Obama was projected to finish second, with John Edwards third.
Heavy turnout was reported by state election officials. A survey of voters as they left their polling places showed the economy was the top issue for nearly half the Republican electorate. Terrorism, the war in Iraq and immigration followed in importance. Not surprisingly in a state that is a magnet for retirees, more than one-third of the voters were 65 or older.
McCain was benefiting from the support of self-described moderates, as well as Hispanics and older voters. Romney was favored by voters opposed to abortion and opposed to easing the path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.
The poll was conducted by Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International for NBC News, the other television networks and The Associated Press.
First, I want to point out that for the Democratic primary, Florida's delegates have been stripped by the Democratic Party due to Florida's moving its primary date to January 29th. This is the same punishment that took place with Michigan, where Senator Hillary Clinton won the Michigan primary, but will not get any delegates from that win. Florida and Michigan will not be able to seat their delegates at the Democratic convention. Clinton is trying to get the Democratic Party to reverse their decision and allow Clinton to seat Michigan and Florida's delegates. At this point, nothing has been determined except that we've had these two popularity contests within the Democratic Party.
However, the Republican Party is another story. John McCain took around 35 percent of the vote, while Mitt Romney took a close 31 percent. Rudy Giuliani ended up in third place at 16 percent. McCain won a close squeaker in Florida. The McCain campaign has had some money troubles, where he is not getting enough campaign donations to keep him going in the primary without accepting federal matching funds, and to still have enough to finance the general election. So far, McCain has raised $7 million for January, and has qualified for federal matching funds. However McCain has a $3 million line of credit that he needs to pay off. What McCain needs to do is to forgo the federal matching funds for as long as he can until the general election. This is where Florida comes in. The win in Florida places McCain just a step closer to the front-runner status, which could provide more donations to the McCain campaign coffers. This will keep the McCain campaign running through Super Duper Tuesday. And if McCain wins big on Super Duper Tuesday, then he could become the GOP front-runner, where he can focus his campaigning--and raising campaign donations--as a general election candidate. In simpler terms, the Florida win has kept the McCain campaign alive until Super Duper Tuesday.
Now let's go to Mitt Romney. Romney had a strong second-place finish here, just around five percentage points behind McCain. This doesn't mean that Romney's campaign is finished here. But Romney needs to retool his campaign to somehow blunt this re-energized Straight Talk Express. The McCain campaign is running on the Iraq war issue, considering McCain's congressional experience in military and foreign affairs issues. Romney has been trying to shift the debate to economic issues, which Romney considers his own strength. Now this is what is strange here. According to CNN exit polls, Republican voters thought that the economy was the most important issue (At 45 percent), when considering their vote on the candidates. However when choosing which candidate would do a better job with the economy, McCain did better at 40 percent verses Romney's 32 percent. In other words, 40 percent of the voters thought that McCain would do a better job with the economy over that of Romney. What is so strange is that McCain himself has admitted that he doesn't know much about economics. And yet, he is beating Romney on the economic issue. What I think Romney needs to do is to change his campaign message away "Washington is broken and only I can fix it," to a simpler "It's the economy and McCain is stupid" message. Romney needs to hit McCain hard on the economy, and the fact that McCain does not know how to fix the problems of this economy. And Romney needs to make this change now, because there is only seven days before Super Duper Tuesday.
With regards to Rudy Giuliani's campaign, Rudy's finished. He only received 15 percent of the vote. And now Giuliani will plan to endorse John McCain on Wednesday in California. According to this MSNBC story:
ORLANDO, Fla. - After a poor showing in Florida's Republican primary, NBC News and the National Journal reported Tuesday night that Rudy Giuliani will endorse winner John McCain on Wednesday in California.
Speaking to supporters Tuesday night, Giuliani referred to his candidacy repeatedly in the past tense, as though it was over.
“We’ll stay involved and together we’ll make sure that we’ll do everything we can to hand our nation off to the next generation better than it was before,” he said.
A senior Giuliani official told NBC that he will endorse McCain on Wednesday in California, where Republicans are set to debate at the Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley.
Giuliani ran third in Florida, his best showing of the campaign, after spending most of his money and time in the state ahead of Super Tuesday. But it was not nearly good enough to make his last stand in a state that is home to tens of thousands of transplanted New Yorkers.
“The responsibility of leadership doesn’t end with a single campaign, it goes on and you continue to fight for it,” Giuliani said Tuesday night, as supporters with tight smiles crowded behind him. “We ran a campaign that was uplifting.”
Asked directly if he was dropping out of the race, Giuliani said only: “I’m going to California.”
I'm guessing Giuliani is going to attend the GOP debate tomorrow at the Ronald Reagan library, where he will make a big public statement at the debate on endorsing McCain. This will give Rudy lots of media time and spin on his endorsement, provide more brownie points for the McCain campaign in declaring they are the front-runner, and would probably piss off Romney--all at the same time. Giuliani staked his presidential campaign in Florida, and he lost.
Now the question is when will Mike Huckabee drop out of the race. Huckabee got 14 percent of the vote in Florida--just behind Rudy Giuliani. I don't see Huckabee winning the nomination--not with both McCain and Romney fighting each other for the front-running position. Huckabee will probably stay in the race through Super Duper Tuesday, trying to get the evangelical vote in the south and pick up a few southern states, and their delegates, to stick in his camp. If Huckabee wins enough southern state delegates, he could use them to influence McCain or Romney to modify their own presidential platforms on social issues. I'm not sure if Huckabee will able to play king-maker for the GOP, that Edwards could play for the Democrats. I think Huckabee will stay in the GOP race until the money runs out, and then he will withdrawal.
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