Romney Holds 8-Percentage Point lead in Florida [Romney Gingrich [Head-to-Head 50%-48%]

YahooNews ^ | January 27, 2012 | Andy Sullivan

[Steelfish]

Romney Holds 8-Percentage Point lead in Florida By Andy Sullivan

JACKSONVILLE, Florida (Reuters) - Presidential candidate Mitt Romney has opened up a lead of 8 percentage points over rival Newt Gingrich in a Reuters/Ipsos poll in Florida, as he regains front-runner status in the Republican race.

The online poll released on Friday showed Romney, a former Massachusetts governor and private-equity executive, ahead of Gingrich by 41 percent to 33 percent among likely voters in Florida's January 31 Republican primary.

It confirms Romney's recovery in polls, aided by strong debate performances, after a stinging defeat at the South Carolina primary vote last weekend.

Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum trails with 13 percent and Texas Congressman Ron Paul would get 5 percent of the vote. "We've had a pretty wild ride here throughout this primary process but right now in Florida it looks like Romney's back on top," said Chris Jackson, research director for Ipsos Public Affairs.

Other polls in Florida have shown Romney pulling ahead of Gingrich, a former speaker of the House of Representatives.

The Reuters/Ipsos poll was conducted on Thursday and Friday, partially capturing likely voters after the most recent debate in Jacksonville where Romney was seen as a clear winner.

Statistical margins of error are not applicable to online surveys but this poll of 732 likely voters has a credibility interval of plus or minus 4.2 percentage points.

GINGRICH STRONGER IN HEAD-TO-HEAD Conservatives are still somewhat splintered. The poll found that Gingrich and Romney would be virtually tied if Santorum and Paul dropped out of the race.

Romney would win by 50 percent to 48 percent if the race were just between him and Gingrich.

[uncbob]

I guess some of them would force themselves to support Gingrich, IF there were no other choice. But some would probably just support Romney because they couldn’t bring themselves to support Gingrich. Others would support Paul. And some will just not vote at all.

Head to hear Romney was still head so those Santorum votes aren't automatically going to Newt

[CharlesWayneCT]

Hi Finny. Good to see my stalker is still around.

When Romney pretended that DeMint’s 2008 endorsement of Romnety meant he was supporting hinm today, true conservatives here at FR denounced that as dishonest and sleazy.

Since the vast majority at FR knew back in May that Gingrich was no longer the “conservative icon” that we were looking for, your attempt to distract people from that fact probably won’t work.

We know why Gingrich is being supported — because he is ahead in the polls and so can beat Romney. Only a few are trying to delude themselves into thinking Gingrich was really the first or best conservative choice in this race.

I really doubt that even you are so deluded.

[CharlesWayneCT]

The theory espoused was that the Paul voters would go to Romney, while the Santorum folks went to Gingrich.

But in fact, if the Paul voters didn’t just stay home, I think they’d be no more likely to support one or the other.

[BillyBoy]

>> Folks, remember that this same guy who describes Santorum as "the more conservative and more electable," was, four years ago, one of the biggest Mitt Romney supporters on Free Republic. <<

You've just described what most Gingrich voters did on this board four years when Fred Thompson dropped out. JimRob endorsed Huckabee but the vast majority of freepers stampeded to the more liberal Romney and proclaimed he was the best remaining candidate of the four choices (McCain, Romney, Huckabee, Paul). Now that we're down to four again, most of those freepers are on the Newt bandwagon.

[WHBates]

"Lot more political savvy people than me here, can Newt turn it around?

Don't know this is a big state, but I question it actually. I just early voted today and funny thing is within 15 minutes of leaving the polling place I received a polling call on my cell phone, asking who I supported in the election. The strange thing is that my cell area code is not a Florida area code and the area code of my phone has already voted last week. Very strange, I believe the reason for all of the negative crush coming down on Gingrich is that Romney polling isn't going well. His is the only outfit that could afford that kind of polling.

[CainConservative]

Forget Paul, he’s never getting out.

But common sense says Santorum is hurting Newt.

[CainConservative]

“..this board four years when Fred Thompson dropped out. JimRob endorsed Huckabee but the vast majority of freepers stampeded to the more liberal Romney.”

Then that vast majority must have been smoking crack.

Go Newt!

[BillyBoy]

>> Then that vast majority must have been smoking crack. <<

I didn't agree with the pro-Romney forces on FR back in 2008, but they made a simple argument:

Romney's record might have been worse than Huckabee - HOWEVER, the "MOST IMPORTANT" (apparently "only") concern in the primary was "STOPPING McCAIN"), and they insisted that ONLY Romney had the national name ID, money, resources, and speaking ability to do that (and ignored the fact that Huckabee had actually won more votes at that point)

Therefore, Huckabee was only staying in to be a "spoiler", and needed to "drop out and endorse Romney", so Romney would have a unified conservative base to "beat McCain"

Gee, you don't suppose any similar arguments are popping up in 2012?

[jmaroneps37]

Notice there is no talk of how many respondents answered the poll. The Sun Coast poll had over 2500 and Newt was at 35.46% to Willard's 35.08% but we don't like that poll which is five times larger than any other so we don't talk about it /s/

Newt may yet pull this out. If not he will not be embarrassed. When Santorum leaves Newt gets a boost. Pray that God helps us.