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New Polls Have Romney Narrowly Ahead in South Carolina, Well in the Lead in Florida

Jan 13, 2012

By Dave Andrusko

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney

With victories under his belt in Iowa’s caucuses (by eight votes) and New Hampshire’s primary (by 16.4 percentage points), former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney is the beneficiary of a lot of welcomed  “can he be stopped?” analysis and plenty of unwelcomed criticism by his Republican presidential competitors.

Most analyses that more or less argue Romney’s inevitable nomination begin with the fact that no Republican had ever won both Iowa and New Hampshire. But it is also true that while Romney is well ahead in Florida, with the exception of a CNN/TIME poll which has him in the lead by 18 points,  the margin in South Carolina is 2 points (Insider Advantage) to 7 points (Public Policy Polling), with Rasmussen Reports, at 3 points, in the middle.

Breaking the numbers down further, you see the best result for former Speaker Newt Gingrich is the Insider/Advantage poll of likely South Carolina Republican primary voters released today which found Gingrich narrowly behind Romney, 23% to 21%. (Gingrich is also second in the Public Policy Poll, trailing by 7 points.)

Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, at 14%, is one point ahead of Texas congressman Ron Paul. Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman has 7%, and Texas Gov. Rick Perry has 5%.  The poll was conducted for the Augusta Chronicle and Savannah Morning News newspapers.

The most optimistic results for Santorum are found in the Rasmussen Reports survey, where he finishes second, trailing Romney by only 27% to 24%. (Santorum was also second in the CNN/TIME poll, although in this case Romney led Santorum by a whopping 18 points, 37% to 19%.)

The conventional wisdom argument is that candidates who do poorly in the Palmetto state would be less than likely to continue on to Florida, which, unlike South Carolina is a huge state with very expensive media markets. Maybe, maybe not.

Stay tuned.

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Categories: Politics