he s the only guy on earth? that s rick santorum. he has a retail campaign, actually, but not on tv. no one saw him. all the other candidates died. when newt gingrich collapsed, that vote had to go somewhere. guess who, the only guy they didn t know? rick santorum. his supporters would say, working every county. they would say, here s a guy talking about blue collar jobs and connecting with people. not that everybody else in the campaign trail dropped dead and he s just the last guy. the message, blue collar jobs is important and one that s referred to little in this race. that s very powerful. his support is responding to the pro-life message much more. i think we would a lot of press would like santorum to do well, that would validate campaigning. he has been doing iowa the way you re supposed to. the way jimmy carter did it. old school. 99 counties. and because the alternative is that actually mitt romney can win even though he s campaigned here very little and simply used
because, again, still, 50% of the people register in the polls as undecided, in iowa. very strong suspicion we re going to see a lot of people coming out and voting for me. yeah, but undecideds not the word of the day. the word of the day is momentum and the candidate who has momentum going into tonight is rick santorum. a survey taken december 27th to 2es 30th had his 15% behind mitt romney and ron paul. then in a smaller two-day poll using just the two most recent days in that survey, he explodes. jumps to 21%, surging past ron paul. let s get right to jim acosta, who s in des moines, for quite a while. at the site of the rock the caucus event where santorum and ron paul will speak later today. jim, good morning. give me a sense of the feel. is it desperation among candidates? is it enthusiasm? is it confidence? what are you seeing? reporter: you know, i think it s excitement. you know, we were out chasing
good morning. it s an early start. 26 minutes in the east. ooich ashleigh banfield. and i m zoraida sambolin. we are at the cnn election center. on the agenda in the next half hour for you tea party s rookie caucus, first caucus in the first presidential race for the tea party, could they make or break mitt romney tonight? trying to figure out what will happen there. the chairman of the tea party express will join us to talk a little about that. and because our a rick santorum surge we need to talk about. because our wake-up segment was so successful last hour. we called joey pants to wake him up frp the sopranos a total bust. total bust. we re switching gear s and goin to wake up john king.
electability. mitt romney at 48%. gingrich 13%, rick santorum stood at 7%. very telling. definitely. rick, i wish high more time for you. i know you have a busy day. you ll probably be on tv all day, but thank you for being with us and have fun tonight as well. you bet, ashleigh. thanks and good luck. thank you very much. looks like he s warming up there. not exactly flip-flopping but newt gingrich after saying he didn t think he was going to win iowa has had a bit of a change of heart. maybe now he believes that the first nominating contest is his to lose? maybe he expects a big upset? maybe he ll pull it off? maybe, maybe, maybe. i m so sick of it. can t wait to hear the numbers. coming up at 8:00, soledad will talk with the former speaker and his two daughter, who are very much a part of his campaign. because my dentures fit well. before those little pieces would get in between
i love super bowl ads. i can t wait. christine romans, thanks. thank you. time to check top stories at 16 past the hour. down to iowa. tonight the first nominating contest still could be anybody s race. horse race. they ll begin caucuses at 7:00 central time. 8:00 eastern time and right now if you ve been watching the pollsish mitt romney on top. ron paul going in strong. rick santorum, tick, tick, tick, tick, fighting for that number two spot. maybe number one. and iowans saying, are you kidding? we could still have our minds changed. and responsible for more than 50 arson fires. that s him, smirking. burkhart. officials say burkhart, a german national was angry that his mother was about to be deported. the story of egypt, starting to present their case against former president hosni mubarak today. you might remember, he got sick, real sick, after being arrested and now is wheeled in. take a look at pictures.