Doubts about his ability to excite the conservative base remain amid concerns over his chances of beating Obama in November
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has got his campaign back on track by winning the Maine caucuses, holding off a strong challenge from the outsider, Texas Congressman Ron Paul.
Although Romney will be relieved to have chalked up a victory after losing three contests in mid-week, he saw a huge 31% majority from the 2008 Republican nominating race shrink to just 3%. The narrowness of the win keeps alive doubts about his ability to excite the conservative base, and concerns that a lack of enthusiasm could prove a problem against Barack Obama in November.
Romney now has four wins (New Hampshire, Florida, Nevada and Maine) to Rick Santorum's three (Minnesota, Iowa and Colorado), plus Santorum's victory in a popularity contest in Missouri where nothing was at stake. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has just one, South Carolina.
Maine was a big disappointment for Paul who invested a lot of time and had hoped finally to make a breakthrough and win a state.
With 95% of the votes counted ? some caucuses had to be delayed by snow ? Romney took 39%, 2,190 votes, to Paul's 36% with 1,996 votes. Santorum took 18% and Gingrich 6%. Neither Santorum or Gingrich campaigned in Maine.
Maine was important for Romney because it allows him to finish on a high ahead of an almost three-week break. The next round of contests is not until 28 February with Michigan and Arizona.
Romney, in a statement issued after the Maine result, portrayed himself as a Washington outsider. "I am the only candidate in the race who has never served a day in our broken federal government. The voters of Maine have sent a clear message that it is past time to send an outsider to the White House, a conservative with a lifetime of experience in the private sector, who can uproot Washington's culture of taxing and spending and borrowing and endless bureaucracy."
The win in Maine comes on top of a win for Romney in a straw poll at the conservative mega-conference in Washington, the Conservative Political Action Conference. He took 38% of the 3,804 votes, Santorum 31%, Gingrich 15% and Paul 12%.
That is a good result for Romney, given that the attendees tend to be die-hard conservatives, a group that often view him as too moderate.
Paul put his best face on the Maine result, declaring it a tie. He later conceded, in an interview with CNN, that Mitt Romney had re-established himself as frontrunner. He suggested he expected him to be the eventual winner, though noting he had failed to enthuse conservatives. "He is out in front ? He picked up a little steam today," Paul said.
Paul's long-term strategy is to build up a bloc of delegates to take to the party convention in Tampa, Florida, and expressed satisfaction with the high portion of delegates he expected to take from Maine. The vote on Saturday is non-binding and Paul predicted that when the delegates to the convention are eventually chosen he would have a majority.
But even that would be a small victory in the greater scheme of things. Maine was Paul's best hope to win a state and he failed. That will not stop him continuing to gather delegates to take to the convention and seek concessions from the eventual winner.
Romney is favourite to win Arizona, partly because of its big Mormon population and because of the support of its senator John McCain. He should be favourite to win Michigan, which is his home state, but Santorum appears intent on achieving an upset.
Romney won Maine by a large margin in 2008, with 52% of the vote, with Paul coming third on 18% behind the eventual Republican nominee John McCain on 21%. There are 24 delegates at stake in Maine.
One the last day of the CPAC meeting, Palin avoided endorsing any of the Republican candidates but he hinted at opposition to Romney. She said the nominee "must be someone who can instinctively turn right to constitutional conservative principles."
A national opinion poll released late on Saturday from Public Policy Polling, puts Santorum well in front on 38%, with Romney on 23%, Gingrich 17% and Paul 13%.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/12/mitt-romney-maine-caucuses-victory
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