Newt Gingrich, Republican Presidential Candidate | featured news

Mitt Romney can argue that winning ugly is still winning, especially in a contest he could not afford to lose. But Romney’s decisive victory in Florida came at a price. He aggravated Newt Gingrich’s hostility to him, with all the trouble that could entail, and left behind a dispirited Republican electorate in a state the GOP needs to win this fall.

Mitt Romney won the Florida presidential primary Tuesday, taking a long stride toward capturing the GOP nomination and dealing a potentially mortal blow to the hopes of the once-resurgent Newt Gingrich.

Mitt Romney opened a double-digit lead over Newt Gingrich in a new poll ahead of Tuesday’s Florida Republican primary, but the Gingrich campaign insisted that the former House speaker is staying in the GOP nomination race for the long haul and remains the only conservative able to beat President Obama in November.

Newt Gingrich today accused front-running Mitt Romney of waging a dishonest campaign, saying the former governor is trying to cover up liberal stances in his past.

On Saturday night’s “Justice with Jeanine” on the Fox News Channel, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin once again stopped just short of giving former House Speaker Newt Gingrich her outright endorsement for the Republican nomination. Palin explained that despite criticisms of Gingrich’s long career in Washington, D.C., she doesn’t consider him part of the establishment because that same “establishment” is trying to hard to keep him from becoming the nominee.

Abraham Foxman, the amiably chatty director of the Jewish civil rights group, the Anti-Defamation League, has a story to tell about his friend, the 78-year-old multi-billionaire casino mogul Sheldon Adelson. Adelson, who is America's eighth richest man and has given millions of dollars in support of Newt Gingrich's presidential bid, was having dinner with Foxman in Las Vegas several years ago. Foxman let slip that he was having to miss an invitation to the White House from the then president, George W. Bush. Foxman explained it was impossible to get a commercial flight. Adelson replied: "If the president of the United States asks you to go, you go." Then he gave Foxman the use of his private plane.

A harsh new ad from former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney uses news footage from 1997 to remind voters of then-House speaker Newt Gingrich’s ethics violations. “History Lesson” is unusual in that neither Romney nor Gingrich appears. The entire 30-second spot consists of an NBC News report from Jan. 21, 1997, the day Gingrich was reprimanded by Congress for using tax-exempt money for political purposes and giving the House Ethics Committee false information.

The hands came out of the pockets. The gaze was intense. Mitt Romney leaned confidently into the lectern. Even with the sound turned off, Romney would have stolen Newt Gingrich's debate thunder with a surprisingly commanding and aggressive performance in the latest Florida faceoff, body language experts said Friday.

After a brief scare, Mitt Romney appears to have reclaimed the advantage in Florida heading into the final weekend of campaigning before Tuesday's presidential primary.