As Cain, Perry scramble, Gingrich seeks an opening

WASHNGTON (AP) — Mitt Rom­ney chugged ahead Thurs­day as the conservative-fueled drive to deny him the Repub­li­can pres­i­den­tial nom­i­na­tion reached a dif­fi­cult new phase: Once-surging rivals Rick Perry and Her­man Cain scram­bled to con­trol seri­ous dam­age, while an old face sought new ways to exploit their problems.

For­mer House Speaker Newt Gin­grich could emerge as the newest hope for con­ser­v­a­tive activists who doubt Romney’s com­mit­ment to their pri­or­i­ties. But Gin­grich trails Rom­ney and oth­ers in orga­niz­ing in key states such as Iowa. And he will have to prove that his long and some­times trou­bled polit­i­cal his­tory can with­stand closer scrutiny.

Mean­while, Texas Gov. Perry rearranged his sched­ule Thurs­day to try to mit­i­gate a dis­as­trous debate moment, in which he could not remem­ber the third fed­eral agency he has vowed to abol­ish. Perry can­celed a Ten­nessee fundraiser to appear on sev­eral TV net­works and the David Let­ter­man show, pledg­ing to stay in the race.

He repeat­edly said he “stepped in it” at the Wednes­day night debate but declared in an inter­view, “This ain’t a day for quit­ting nothing.”

For Cain, the for­mer pizza com­pany exec­u­tive, it was day 11 of try­ing to get beyond sex­ual harass­ment accu­sa­tions lev­eled against him by four women, two of whom received cash set­tle­ments from a trade asso­ci­a­tion Cain once headed.

Fac­ing vot­ers for the first time since the alle­ga­tions emerged, Cain met with tea party groups in Michi­gan, hop­ing the friendly set­tings would pre­serve the lofty perch he enjoyed in GOP polls two weeks ago.

“How you beat Obama? Beat him with a Cain!” he told one sup­porter at a crowded diner in Ypsi­lanti. The crowd cheered.

He is air­ing his first TV ad in Iowa, and he has hired a new lawyer who is warn­ing women they will be scru­ti­nized for any charges made against the candidate.

Rom­ney, the for­mer Mass­a­chu­setts gov­er­nor who recently filmed a TV ad in Iowa, blasted Pres­i­dent Barack Obama’s Iran pol­icy in a Wall Street Jour­nal opin­ion piece Thurs­day. His sup­port­ers qui­etly rev­eled in the good for­tune of Perry’s and Cain’s woes.

With the Iowa cau­cus set for Jan. 3, and the New Hamp­shire pri­mary a week after that, Rom­ney is look­ing strong, but he’s hardly home free. Many con­ser­v­a­tives still resent his past sup­port of legal­ized abor­tion and gay rights, and his require­ment that all Mass­a­chu­setts res­i­dents obtain health insurance.

But they have failed to coa­lesce around a sin­gle alter­na­tive. Rep. Michele Bach­mann briefly topped the polls, fol­lowed by Perry and then Cain. It’s unclear whether Cain can hold his position.

Some Iowa Repub­li­cans hope for­mer Penn­syl­va­nia Sen. Rick San­to­rum, who empha­sizes social con­ser­v­a­tive issues such as abor­tion and gay rights, can make a move. He has vis­ited all 99 Iowa coun­ties and aired radio commercials.

Other party insid­ers feel the per­son best poised to rise is Gin­grich, the fiery Geor­gian who led the GOP’s 1994 takeover of the House (after 40 years in the minor­ity). He even­tu­ally lost his lead­er­ship post and left the House after clash­ing with Pres­i­dent Bill Clin­ton over taxes and an unpop­u­lar gov­ern­ment showdown.

Gin­grich is adding staff in key states, open­ing new offices this week and rais­ing more money than he has in months.

With Rom­ney widely seen as the front-runner in New Hamp­shire, a rival must do well in Iowa to sur­pass him. Gin­grich is pop­u­lar with many Iowa Repub­li­cans, and he drew good reviews for his speech at a large din­ner in Des Moines last week.

But he has lit­tle struc­ture in place for the orga­ni­za­tion­ally inten­sive cau­cuses, which require peo­ple to show up for gath­er­ings on a mid-winter night. Gin­grich has not done much of the retail-level cam­paign­ing seen by past suc­cess­ful cau­cus can­di­dates. His sched­ule in the next 10 days shows him vis­it­ing the state to pro­mote a movie he pro­duced with his wife and par­tic­i­pate in a multi-candidate event aimed at social con­ser­v­a­tive activists

Gin­grich has had no paid staff in Iowa since a mass exo­dus of his cam­paign team in June. He plans to name a staff and open cam­paign head­quar­ters in Iowa soon,

“What I’m see­ing now is a real surge of energy” for Gin­grich, said sup­porter Linda Upmeyer, Iowa’s House major­ity leader. “The bright, shiny things have come and gone, and now peo­ple are focus­ing on a decision.”

A key ques­tion is whether Rom­ney will see Cain’s and Perry’s prob­lems as a chance to make a big push in Iowa. A win there would make him the pro­hib­i­tive favorite. But to fare poorly after rais­ing expec­ta­tions would echo his dis­ap­point­ing Iowa per­for­mance four years ago.

Rom­ney has made only four pub­lic vis­its to Iowa this year. But a small core of advis­ers and staff keeps in close touch with key ele­ments of the Iowa net­work he assem­bled in 2007.

Rom­ney has phoned activists and held mul­ti­ple question-and-answer con­fer­ence calls that included thou­sands of poten­tial vot­ers. He has been the most con­sis­tent poll leader in Iowa with­out pulling away. The Des Moines Register’s late-October sur­vey showed Rom­ney with 22 per­cent, nar­rowly trail­ing Cain.

Rom­ney has a healthy con­tin­gent of precinct-level cau­cus lead­ers, an edge over many of his rivals. He has spon­sored phone calls crit­i­ciz­ing Perry’s posi­tion on immigration.

How­ever, Rom­ney has avoided mul­ti­can­di­date forums in Iowa. He is not expected to par­tic­i­pate in an event spon­sored by a social con­ser­v­a­tive group in Des Moines on Nov. 19, or the evening fundraiser for Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad the same evening. Sev­eral other can­di­dates are expected at both events.

Bach­mann had a bumpy day Thurs­day. About 30 Occupy Wall Street pro­test­ers loudly inter­rupted her for­eign pol­icy speech in Mount Pleas­ant, S.C., say­ing she was divid­ing the nation. Bach­mann left the stage but returned and fin­ished her speech after the pro­test­ers departed.

Posted by AP News on Nov 10 2011. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.