Huckabee Wins Evangelical Vote . . . Romney Wins Everybody Else

Mike Huckabee won the Iowa Caucuses. In the spirit of graciousness that Mitt Romney exuded last night, Huckabee is to be congratulated. Good job, you won fair and square.

However, in the spirit of an ardent Romney supporter and as someone who likes to look into the detailed demographics of voting/polls, I'd be worried if I were Mike Huckabee.

The New York Times is reporting that OVER 80% of Huckabee caucus supporters described themselves as Evangelical Christians.

Mr. Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, rode a crest of evangelical Christian support to victory on Thursday over his rival Mitt Romney, capping a remarkable ascent over the last two months from near the bottom of the Republican field. A poll of people entering the Republican caucuses on Thursday showed more than 8 in 10 of his supporters identified themselves as evangelicals.

The same surveys showed extraordinary turnout among evangelicals, who represented some 60 percent of Republican caucusgoers. In years past, Republican Party leaders in Iowa put evangelical turnout at about 40 percent [actually, this story reports that the 2000 evangelical turnout was 39%].

Mr. Romney’s advisers had been saying that if evangelical turnout rose to more than 50 percent, victory would be impossible for Mr. Romney, whose Mormon faith is regarded as heretical by many evangelicals.

And lead paragraphs like this don't help the image of Huckabee's win here:

DES MOINES — Just as the Republican caucuses began on Thursday at 6:30 p.m., a small group of women and children joined hands in the middle of the ballroom at Mike Huckabee's headquarters here and began to pray for his election.

Now I want to be clear, I love the evangelical community. In the conservative coalition I align myself strongly with Christian conservatism. We all need eachother. And I can definitely see the appeal of Huckabee to Evangelical voters (at least superfiscially, and before a deep probing of him and his campaign).

Going back to the numbers . . . Rich Lowry put it pretty clearly:

Here's one way to look at it: 60% of voters were evangelicals. Huck beat Romney among them 45-19%. 40% weren't evangelicals. Romney beat Huck among them 33-13%.

The breakdown goes as such:

Evangelicals:

• Huckabee 46%
• Romney 19%
• Thompson 11%
• Paul 10%
• McCain 10%
• Giuliani 2%

Everyone else:

• Romney 33%
• McCain 18%
• Thompson 17%
• Huckabee 13%
• Paul 11%
• Giuliani 6%
  

So in Iowa, Romney beat Huckabee almost 3 to 1 among non-evangelicals. That doesn't bode well for Huckabee outside of the southern states. What's also encouraging is that Romney came in 2nd place among Evangelicals.

Turnout for the GOP in the Iowa Caucuses was projected to be 80,000. It turns out that there were 114,000 voters . . . and it represents the highest turnout of Evangelicals ever (by a long shot) at nearly 70,000.

However, this other New York Times article shows that, while 25% of the US population consider themselves Evangelicals, only 12% of the US population are "traditionalist" Evangelicals. The rest are "centrists" or "modernists" and their votes split between the parties. If Huckabee thinks that he can count on the "traditionalist" Evangelical vote to carry him to the nomination, he's sorely misinformed. If he somehow manages to get the nomination, Evangelicals surely won't be enough to carry him into the White House. The Dems are still licking their chops at the prospect of him being the nominee.

The good news heading into New Hampshire is that the Romney camp turned out MORE people than they thought they would--over 30,000 votes. But if not for the super showing by the evangelicals, Romney would have won this going away. His 30,000+ votes among the projected 80,000 voters would have been nearly 40% of the vote . . . a convincing victory similar to Bush's Iowa win in 2000. Huckabee over-performed last night at nearly 40,000 votes. But LESS THAN 10,000 of those voters were NOT evangelicals (fewer votes than even Ron Paul got in the caucuses). Put another way, only 1 out of every 330 non-evangelical Iowans turned out to vote for Huckabee as their next commander in chief. Hardly a "mandate" for him.

The likely outcome of the Iowa GOP delegate count is very interesting too:

Huckabee - 34% (17 delegates)
Romney - 25% (12 delegates)
Thompson - 13% (3 delegates)
McCain - 13% (3 delegates)
Paul - 10% (2 delegates)
Giuliani - 4% (no delegates)

New Hampshire is not "winner take all" for their GOP delegates either (all 12 of them). However NH shakes out, it's still pretty clear that Romney will be the leader in total delegates after NH (counting the delegates he'll probably pick up tomorrow in Wyoming). That may be a convincing argument to Romney passing the viability and electability test and being the one who can re-unite the conservative coalition.

Romney supporters need to realize what a strange aberration of evangelical outpouring the Iowa caucus was. Romney turned out his supporters. He'll do the same in NH. He's the best candidate we have bar none. As another Romney supporter said, it's time to quickly lick our wounds and battle on.

Johnson County Update part 2 : MITT WINS ! ! !

It's official! With 96.5% of votes repoted, I think I will call it.....

Johnson County has definitely been won by MITT ROMNEY!!

Results are HERE. and see below:


1. Mitt Romney 1247 31.4%
2. Mike Huckabee 883 22.2%
3. John McCain 608 15.3%
4. Ron Paul 604 15.2%
5. Fred Thompson 349 8.8%
6. Rudolph Giuliani 269 6.8%
7. Duncan Hunter 10 0.3%

I couldn't be happier!! Thanks to all of our Johnson County volunteers and voters!

Keith

North Liberty / Johnson County update

Here in Johnson county the big news is turnout. As we were turning in the binders to the county, the buzz was the huge turnout. I was the temporary and then permanent chair in North Liberty 01 precinct (I ran the caucus and elections). We are the largest precinct in Johnson County because the county auditor is too lazy to split us up. We ended up having 233 voters and another 100 kids at our site. We completely filled the bleachers at the middle school gym. Two years ago, the turnout in this precinct was 10 voters. Big difference. This has been a common theme to other precincts reporting in throughout the night. We also had about 70 same-day-voter-registrations. Those caused some delays at check-in, but it got people in the door. Interestingly, Mitt Romney was the only candidate to have any stickers or signs handed out at the caucus. I saw a few other stickers, but I think they were brought from home.

So, of course, this was a huge victory for our county republican party, too. We have added a huge number of central committee members and we have plenty of delegates to go around.

As for the numbers between the big rivals, North Liberty 01 was won by MITT ROMNEY! The final was 75 Romney votes to 66 Huckabee votes out of 233 voters (32% to 28%). I am so happy that my own precinct won. Of course, we are still waiting to hear about Johnson County composite results, but I would take a guess that Mitt Romney has also won the county. I will throw up numbers once we get them next week.

Indeed, all votes count in Iowa for the Republican caucus, and at 85% reporting, Huck is leading Romney with 9 points. Huck has been called as the winner, but I have some other ideas on who won.
-First, the volunteers helping the Romney campaign in Iowa are winners. They helped Mitt go from an unknown name to a front runner who secured 25% of the votes in Iowa. We've had deidcated volunteers in Johnson County since January. We had a huge number of supporters travel to Ames to vote at the Straw poll. We had a campaign office here in Iowa City packed with volunteers all week to get the last push. We saw amazing sacrifices made by our supporters to help the campaign here in the county, and I am so thankful for that! Thank you to all our volunteers and supporters here!
-Second, the campaign staff are winners! They organized an amazing feat here in Iowa. I don't know how many precincts we have total here, but they had to put together packets for every precinct in the state. They made the straw poll look like nothing compared to what they put together since then. The leadership here in Iowa was great, and a pleasure to volunteer with.
-Third, Mitt Romney is a winner tonight. He proved tonight that someone from outside of Washington can get thru to voters. Let's ignore the evangelical tidal wave that Huck rode in on today, and realize that second place in Iowa is still a huge feat. By no means is Romney done just because of a silver medal in Iowa. He has a lot of campaign resources left over, and he has plenty of organization to carry him thru the upcoming primaries. He's going to hunker down in New Hampshire where the evangelicals don't have a chance, and he is going to focus on the economy to reel in Michigan. Wyoming is in the bag for Romney, and so is Nevada, despite it's lack of legitimacy as a state. Without a doubt, New Hampshire is going to be a vicious contest now. I can't wait to see how it turns out. I am so glad I was part of this in Iowa. Truly amazing! I am still quite happy that NL 01 went to Mitt Romney!

The Speech: YouTube Version

Date altered above to keep this at the top of the blog (and the next two blog entries as well).



It's 20 minutes but well worth the time. Especially the last 3-4 minutes.

Loved it more the third time. Truly a great speech that he wrote himself. Very presidential delivery. This man is what American needs!!!

Caucus Training from Gentry Collins, Mitt Romney, and Ann Romney

Trouble Ahead for Mike Huckabee in Iowa? Updated and Expanded

I altered the date on this post to keep it at the top of the blog entries until caucus day (by popular demand)

Huckabee and his supporters always seem to point out that Romney's attacking him. The already nascent Huck-a-bust will undoubtedly be blamed on Romney by Huck and his supporters. However . . . I don't think that Romney had anything to do with the fact that essentially every conservative with a microphone or blog has been railing against Huckabee for the last few weeks. Need some evidence?:

Rush Limbaugh
Condoleezza Rice
Michelle Malkin
Ann Coulter (new one here)
Phyllis Schlafly
Bob Novak (others here & here)
Peggy Noonan
Charles Krauthammer
Bob Dole
Sean Hannity (not frontal attacks, but plenty of concerns about him being the nominee)
Laura Ingraham
Fred Barnes
Joseph Farah (Founder/CEO/Editor of World Net Daily also expresses concern for homeschoolers who support Huck)
Thomas Sowell
George Will (these comments too on a TV news show)
Michael Reagan
Glenn Beck (semi "reconciliation" ---- but then he's still not too impressed)
Donald Lambro
David Limbaugh (another here)
Doug Giles
Michael Barone
Mark Steyn
Kim Strassell
Matt Drudge (it's obvious that he has a bone to pick with Huckabee given his coverage of late)
Pat Buchanan
Jonah Goldberg
John Fund (an interesting video here)
Jim Geraghty
Kathryn Jean Lopez (another here)
Tony Blankley
Howie Carr
James Taranto (here too, don't miss, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4 of "No Truck with Huck")
Clarence Page
Dean Barnett
Rich Karlgaard
Rich Lowry (this one too)
Mark Hemingway
Austin Hill
Quin Hillyer
Tom Bevan
Jack Kelly
Deroy Murdock
David Frum
Jonathan Alder
John Hinderaker
Bruce Bartlett
Victor Davis Hanson
Johnathan Tobin
Hugh Hewitt (and another)
Walter E. Williams
David Reinhard
Frank Gaffney (who Huck claimed was one of his Foreign Policy advisors)
Lori Byrd
Peter Wehner
Douglas MacKinnon
Paul Mirengoff ( here and here too)
Jerome Corsi
The Editors of National Review (Oh yeah, this one too and both were written BEFORE the NR endorsed Romney)
The Club for Growth
The Cato Institute (Huckabee's F grade for fiscal issue . . . 46th out of the 50 governors ranked. Yes, that's worse than the vast majority of Democratic governors!--PDF here)
Mitt Romney :)
Ron Paul :)
Fred Thompson :)
Rudy Giuliani :)

You can just hear and feel all of these conservative/GOP icons pleading with the voters: "PLEASE DON'T MAKE US TRY TO DEFEND THIS GUY!!!" (should he be the nominee).

Conclusion: Huckabee's not a full-spectrum conservative and the GOP would be unwise to give him the nomination. Romney has had to point out the un-conservative spots in Huck's record because the MSM/DNC axis sure hasn't been (they want him as the GOP nominee) and because McCain and Rudy want Huck to win Iowa to stifle Romney's path to the nomination. However, Romney is hardly alone in pointing out Huckabee's worrisome record.

Update: This post has attracted some attention! Hugh Hewitt's Townhall.com blog linked to my cross-posting over at MyManMitt. Also, Quin Hillyer's recent article "The Republican Party: All Hucked Up" contains a list that is interestingly familiar to mine.

What Happened In The Rest Of Iowa?

In my precinct, Romney won more than twice as many votes as Huckabee, who only had one more vote than Fred. What a surprise to come home and pull up drudge report and see that the rest of Iowa had gone strongly for Huck?

Well, you know how it is. Everyone gets a vote.

Clearly this is an evangelical phenomenon. Evangelicals turned out in uncharacteristically huge numbers and voted for Huckabee.

Just a couple of random thoughts.

First of all, kudos to Obama. I'm happy he won, so that New Hampshire Independents won't be artificially boosting McCain's numbers.

Take a look at http://www.iowagop.net/ and there's a map that shows the votes for each individual county. Up in the northwest of Iowa, Huckabee really pulled out huge victory. Those are the same counties that delivered the state to George W Bush back in 2004.

I think there is enough dis-satisfaction within other segments of the republican coalition with the Iowa process that we're going to see some efforts to take away its first in the nation status. What if Nevada were to pass a law saying that the republican primaries are on the same day as Iowa. It could happen.

Wyoming is SO going Romney's way.

New Hampshire voters, it's up to you. Remember 1996, when Bob Dole was running against Bill Clinton? Remember how he had no money? That's how it's going to be if McCain is the nominee. I like McCain and everything, nothing against McCain. He's talking about taking matching funds though, and all the potential democratic nominees have the ability to outspend him 10 to 1.

Michigan is going to be close. Come on Michigan!!!

South Carolina--- It's going to be a major battle. This is where we see if Huck means it about running a positive campaign. My bet - I don't see it happening. We're going to see a lot of the so far quiet under the table machinations from the Huckabee camp coming out into the open.

I look forward to seeing it.

Romney at Principle Financial Group--Live Blogging

Here at the Principal Financial Group in Des Moines.

I'm sitting next to Townhall's Amanda Carpenter and embedded with the media group following Romney around today . . . IT'S CAUCUS DAY!

Many of the media was put into an overflow room due to an oversized crowd of Principal Financial Group's employees.

He's got three sitting US Senators in tow: Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), Sen. Bob Bennett (R-UT), and Sen. Wayne Allard (R-CO).

Romney states this is his 236th public event here in Iowa.

He commented that Huckabee's campaign manager recently said that he'd "like to knock Romney's teeth out." Romney responded today with . . . "Just don't touch the hair." That got a rousing laugh from the media here in our room (laughing WITH him, not like they were laughing AT him like at the now-famed Huckabee press conference).

He's now into his normal stump speech.

Taking questions . . . gotta run.

Liberal Networks still pushing "Huck and Hillary"

In what can easily be seen as a liberal publicity stunt, the networks brought back late night TV with Huckabee on Jay Leno, and Hillary on Letterman. Huck's dialogue with Jay Leno seemed too prepared and all his jokes seemed like they had been served to him with wind-ups on silver platters. see story here:
http://youdecide08.foxnews.com/2008/01/02/writers-strike-wound-into-iowas-presidential-politics/
There was also some controversy surrounding his appearance in the first place (quoted from the story on Fox):

The return of TV’s late-night funnymen after a two-month strike hiatus turned
into a bizarre mix of picketing and presidential politics Wednesday as Mike
Huckabee headed for Jay Leno’s show and Clinton turned to Letterman.
GOP
hopeful Huckabee appeared confused over which of the two late-night hosts had
reached a separate deal with the union representing striking TV and movie
writers.
Huckabee said he supports the writers and did not think he would be
crossing a picket line, because he believed the writers had made an agreement to
allow late-night shows on the air. That’s not the case with Leno, and pickets
outside Leno’s Burbank, Calif., studio targeted Huckabee.
“Huckabee is a
scab,” read one picket sign.
Late Wednesday, the Writers Guild of America
issued a statement saying that the guild “thanks the former governor for his
strong statement of support for striking writers and hopes that he will not
cross the picket lines at NBC.”
However, Huckabee appeared on the show
despite the calls from the striking writers, according to NBC.

Why the change of heart, Huck? Does this coincide with your change in heart about the negative ad, too? All were media stunts, nothing more. Does poor Huckabee realize why they are loving him so much yet?

Hillary passed a taped message to Letterman as well. This seems obvious to me that the liberal networks couldn't stand not having their political agenda played out on the late night shows and had to get these 2 shows up and running in time to get one last shot at what they want: Hillary in the White House. So what about Huckabee? They want him to run against Hillary because they know he is an easy kill. We have blogged about this on multiple occasions. It's my opinion and my theory, and I am sticking to it.

One last reminder: head out Thursday night and caucus for America's true conservative and problem solver: Mitt Romney! Tomorrow is the big day!

More Christian Conservative Leaders Coalesce with Romney

Per Iowa Independant . . .

Mitt Romney received the endorsement of two prominent Christian
conservatives over the weekend, a sign that rival Mike Huckabee hasn't cornered
the market on self-described "pro-family" voters.

Romney was endorsed by the Rev. Morris Hurd, a Burlington pastor and
chairman of the Iowa Christian Alliance and State Rep. Betty De Boef, a What
Cheer Republican and one of the most strident social conservatives in the Iowa
legislature.

The Charlatan's Cynical Charade: Iowa Voters Are Not Fooled So Easily Mr. Huckabee

Jim Geraghty at NRO’s Campaign Spot reports that a local Iowa TV station was told to pull Gov. Huckabee’s negative ad at 10:01am on Monday, at least an hour before Gov. Huckabee, Iowa campaign chair Bob Vander Plaats and campaign chairman Ed Rollins claim that the decision to pull the ad was made.

This discrepancy provides proof for what we all know: Gov. Huckabee’s press conference was a transparently cynical charade. Hopefully Iowa voters will not reward him with a victory tomorrow after he's playing us all for dupes (or at least he's convinced his supporters are).

Per Geraghty (who has not endorsed Romney):

Why Did An Iowa TV Station Yank Huck’s Negative Ad Early?

By Jim Geraghty
January 2, 2008

There’s something of an oddity to the timeline of Mike Huckabee’s decision not to run that negative ad against Mitt Romney.

The word from the Huckabee folks has been that this was a last-minute decision. During the press conference which began at 12:30 p.m. local time, Huckabee said, “That was in fact the press conference that we had scheduled. And the one that even our staff thought we were going have here until about 10 minutes ago. About an hour ago, I just decided that’s not the way that we want to run it.”

The event was scheduled to start at noon, so let's say Huckabee meant an hour before the scheduled time, which would put his decision at around 11 a.m.
Huckabee's campaign chairman Ed Rollins puts the decision around that time:
As for the gathering, Rollins says, "Now would I have loved to cancel the press conference? You betcha. Would I have loved to pull the signs down? Yes. But this decision was made about 11, 11:10 in the morning." The news conference was scheduled for noon.

The Politico reports:

Bob VanDerPlaats said Huckabee informed his entire senior campaign
team of his decision upon boarding his campaign bus at around 11:30 to go the press conference.

The problem is, someone on Huckabee's team told KCRG, a television station in Cedar Rapids, not to run the ad at 10 a.m., according to the local Gazette.

An official at KCRG-TV9 TV9 in Cedar Rapids confirmed that the station received the 30-second spot from the Huckabee campaign shortly after 6 a.m. today but was told at 10:01 a.m. not to air the commercial and the
station did not show the paid advertisement.

So why was a local station told at 10 a.m. not to show it, if Huckabee only decided to cancel the ad around 11 a.m.? Did somebody on the campaign cancel the ad without Huckabee's approval? Or is the campaign suggesting that the decision was more last-minute than it really was?

Romney Rules In Iowa Endorsements

Sure, McCain's proved deft in obtaining the endorsements of liberal newspaper editorial boards, but who have Iowa GOP legislators been lining up with?

It's Romney by a long shot. His 17 endorsements form the Iowa State House is more than McCain, Huckabee, AND Giuliani COMBINED!! (even throw in Fred's endorsements and Romney's on par with the total of the other top-tier candidates combined)

PS HAPPY NEW YEAR!! LET'S GET A ROMNEY WIN IN THE CAUCUSES IN TWO NIGHTS!!

Huckabee tapes ad, doesn't show it, then shows it???

Today the Huck held a press conference and said that he had taped a negative ad against Mitt Romney, but then said he would be the "better man" and not air the commercial, but then he played the commercial to all the press at the press conference. I saw it on NBC news at 5:30 pm. I am still trying to find the video online. If you have it, paste the URL in a comment.
Guess what, Huck, that's the same thing as airing the ad. Now all the press are airing out the ad like laundry. Way to shoot yourself in your foot, Mike. Ummmm.... is anyone else as confused as I am. Is he thinking this will drum up support for him? Or is he throwing the election because he bet his salary on himself losing? You can't have that cake and eat it, too. Example given: You can't walk into a bank, and say "I don't have a gun, and I am not robbing this bank" and then slip a note to the teller damanding all the money". It is still technically robbing a bank.

Confused.......

Great New Romney Ad: "Everywhere"

Solid "closing argument" for Romney . . . entitled "Everywhere":

Guest Blog: Why I Support Mitt Romney for President

From a Romney Supporter (who lives and works in Waukee Iowa):

For disclosure sake, my career is no longer made in the world of politics, but I feel so strongly about Mitt Romney, I am inclined to write this email this evening. As a friend and acquaintance, I want to tell you a little about why I am supporting Governor Romney for President. I first met Mitt Romney during the 2004 campaign when he was in Iowa campaigning for President Bush. I was immediately impressed by him, and as 2006 neared and it looked as though he might be thinking of running for President I did some extensive research on him. And, I liked what I found.

I found he was successful in business. His business was to fix broken businesses. He got so good at it, the 2002 Olympics called upon him to fix the Olympics when they were $379 million in debt. Mitt Romney came in and applied the same business models he had used in business to help fix the broken structure of the Olympics, and I think we all remember how successful the 2002 Olympics were, just months after 9/11. His success in the Olympics drew the eye of many at home in Massachusetts, and they asked him to run for Governor. Massachusetts faced immense problems, including a $3 billion debt. Mitt Romney was elected, and applied the same models he had in business, and at the Olympics, and he fixed the problems of Massachusetts without raising taxes or borrowing money, in a state with an 85% democrat legislature. He turned the deficit into a surplus and he put in place private sector health care for all citizens of Massachusetts without raising taxes. His fiscal conservative principles prevailed and turned Massachusetts back around, and got them on the right path again. He also improved the schools to become the best in the nation, stood up for traditional marriage and fought the Supreme Court to preserve marriage as being between one man and one woman only. He stood for life in Massachusetts, where it wasn’t the popular thing to do; but he stood for life because it was the right thing to do. He believes strongly like me that we need to secure our borders, and that children that come to America legally are taught in English.

Over the last couple of years I have gotten to know Mitt Romney as a man of character and integrity. He believes in Strong Families, Strong Economy and a Strong Military. He believes in what we believe in as Iowans; faith, family, hard work and Midwestern values. He has an outstanding record of accomplishment in terms of standing up for Republican values in one of the most liberal parts of America, and proving that Republican principals work. These are just a few reasons why I feel he should be our parties’ nominee. I hope you will help to make him our parties’ nominee by showing up Thursday evening and casting your vote for Mitt Romney in the Iowa Caucus. If you do that, he will be our nominee, and the next President of the United States.

Thanks, and I hope you caucus for Governor Mitt Romney this Thursday evening!