newt gingrich is a distant fourth, only 13%, only 13,000 votes. rick perry, about 10%, 10,000 votes. michele bachmann, 5%, about 5,000 votes. jon huntsman at 1% of the votes. let s go to erick and gloria. what s going on over here? you re looking closely at these numbers. santorum was ahead, now slightly, slightly, mitt romney ahead. we ve been looking as it s flip-flopped around, and each of the leaders and why. now let s look at mitt romney and where his strength is coming from. two things we want to hone in on. we asked people, what s the most important candidate quality, can defeat obama. 31% of the caucusgoers told us that was the most important thing. true conservative, 25%. i m going to tell you right now, those voters went overwhelmingly for ron paul. strong moral character, a quarter of voters said that was most important. and i ll tell you right now,
issues. that s what driving him in iowa. here s the fundamental truth that s drove this entire republican race for mitt romney. as long as there s a multiple number of candidates in the field, mitt romney divides and conquers. that is the whole issue. if it comes down to one candidate against mitt romney, particularly in south carolina, one candidate could beat him. but i don t see any scenario where it s a one-on-one in south carolina. this thing saturday night, this debate, i wouldn t i m not going to miss the saints game, but i m going to come back and get some snippets of it. this is going to be a big deal, because gingrich is going to be smoking mad, they re going to all be facing each other, and it s going to have some kind of determination. because these people in new hampshire are going to be watching this. by the way, i agree with you, they re going to tear the bark off of santorum when this thing comes down. he s got to be a much better debater. he debates as a mean,
that that tough rhetoric continues now and just amplifies in the days ahead? or do they take a step back somehow? yeah, absolutely. i think it continues. i think they get into south carolina now. forget new hampshire. they go to south carolina and it gets uglier. and south carolina is always ugly. let s not forget what happened to nikki haley when she ran two years ago. south carolina is historically ugly. it s going to be real ugly. but there s a sense of blood in the water from a lot of conservative activists tonight, online and offline, that mitt romney spent a lot of money in 2008, he spent a lot of money this time and he hasn t really moved his number. if anything, it s gone down a little bit. conservative activists are thinking, maybe now people will realize, this isn t the guy we want. they re just not sure that santorum is the way we want to go to. erick, you ve been tough on santorum over the last couple of weeks, reading your tweets. what do you make of his numbers tonigh
let me update you right now on what s going on. these are official votes, because 88% of the precincts have now reported. and look at how close it is. rick santorum, look at this, he s 13 votes ahead of mitt romney, 26,552 to 26,539. both 25%. ron paul is coming in a distant third. not necessarily a distant third, but a significant third, 22,821, with 21%. newt gingrich, esi should say, a distant fourth, 13%, 14,300 or so. rick perry, he s 10% with 11,100. michele bachmann, 5,500, only 5%. jon huntsman, 1%. those are the official numbers with 88% of the precincts reporting.
texas congressman not all that far behind. still 12% of the precincts outstanding. but this is close, close, close. let s take a look at the headquarters of these three candidates right now. romney headquarters, the place is full. believe in america. they re standing there, they re watching tv. if they re hearing me say anything, go ahead and wave to that cnn screen, because i m waving at you. mitt romney folks over there in the headquarters, take a look at rick santorum headquarters, faith, family, freedom, they re waving over there as well. rick santorum headquarters, they re going to wait and hear from rick santorum. all of these candidates will eventually speak. ron paul, store america now. take a look at this, ron paul headquarters, they ve got balloons ready to go. he s coming in, he s running a slight third right now, but let s go back to romney headquarters. they re waving. you know why they re waving? because they re watching us. i m waving at you guys right now as well. the m