Newt Gingrich, 2012 Republican Presidential Candidate | featured news

Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Thursday dropped out of the race for the Republican presidential nomination and endorsed Newt Gingrich, adding a fresh layer of unpredictability to the campaign two days before the South Carolina primary.

On a separate issue, Gingrich told reporters that he paid 31 percent of his 2010 income in taxes, more than double the 15 percent Romney said he pays. A Gingrich spokesman said the 31 percent was the effective federal rate on his income. Gingrich declined to criticize Romney on the tax issue, saying instead that it made the case for his own proposal to put in place an optional 15 percent flat income tax. "My goal is not to raise Mitt Romney's taxes, but to let everyone pay Romney's rate," he said.

Mitt Romney came under renewed assault Monday night for his business record and tactics, but in a turnabout, his rivals found themselves forced to defend their criticism and the increasingly harsh tone of the Republican presidential race.

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has opened a wide lead over his rivals in the South Carolina primary election race, trouncing Newt Gingrich and gaining momentum in his march toward the party's nomination, a Reuters/Ipsos poll shows.

Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich on Friday called on a well-heeled outside group supporting his candidacy to correct the inaccuracies in a half-hour film highly critical of GOP front-runner Mitt Romney's career as a venture capitalist or "pull it off the air and off the internet entirely."

In the past twelve hours the six men running for the Republican presidential nomination have debated not once but twice. We live-blogged both debates — the Saturday night set-to sponsored by ABC/WMUR and the “Meet the Press” debate this morning. Below is our combined winners and losers from the two debates. Agree or disagree? That is your right; this country is all about liberty. (Ron Paul homage!) The comments section is open for business.

A Las Vegas billionaire with ties to Newt Gingrich has given $5 million to an independent group backing the former House Speaker's presidential bid.

Mitt Romney faced attacks from both sides after squeaking a record narrow victory in Iowa, with New Hampshire's leading newspaper Thursday urging Republicans to back his rival Newt Gingrich and President Barack Obama's re-election campaign training its sights on him.

Why didn't Newt Gingrich praise Mitt Romney for his squeaker win in Iowa, when he spoke warmly of Rick Santorum, who came within a handful of votes of the top spot? "Other than the fact that Governor Romney ran a relentlessly negative campaign of falsehoods, which earned one of his ads four Pinocchios from the Washington Post?" Gingrich said at a news conference Wednesday. "The fact is, three out of four Republicans rejected him. Governor Romney is a moderate Massachusetts Republican to the left of the vast majority of Republicans. I find it amazing that the media continues to say he's the most electable Republican when he can't even break out in his own party.

Former House speaker Newt Gingrich, who led Iowa and national polls in November, said Monday he did not expect to win Tuesday's Iowa caucuses, but will declare victory because he has survived an onslaught of negative advertising.