mitt romney ahead, rick santorum third. if the margins keep up, that's a place mitt romney can, doesn't mean he will, can make up the votes. more of the votes still out over here. 97% of the vote in linn county. romney winning convincingly in this county right now, by tonight's standards in iowa. if you're the santorum cam pawn where an we make up votes? 100% counted. 100% counted. the western part of the state, 100% counted. you keep coming out there. if you're looking for areas where the vote is still out, they are areas where right now mitt romney is leading. they're not all big areas. there are enough votes still out there, wolf, for mitt romney to catch up and eke this out. this is the second time around for mitt romney. spent $10 million in iowa last night. not as much this time. look at the dark red. that's mitt romney now. that's mitt romney four years ago. i want to just emphasize it by doing this very quickly. do this on the map. this on the map. this on the map. this on the map. then do this up here. governor rom

ron paul is ahead with 24%. 148 votes ahead of rick santorum with 23%. 4,292 for rick santorum. also at 23%, just below rick santorum is mitt romney with 4,183 votes. newt gingrich is distant 13%. 2400 votes or so. rick perry only 10%, 1800 votes. michele bachmann a disappointing 6% withh1,000 votes. only 126 votes for jon huntsman. he didn't even campaign in iowa. 15% of the caucus precincts have reported right now. soledad o'brien is in clive outside of des moines. they're counting votes over there, soledad. >> yeah, there are two precincts that they're counting votes for here in clive. over here i'm looking at precinct two votes being counted. they're starting to sort them. so first they've got to divide them by candidate. after that they count those piles. once they count them for the first time, they'll switch, count those piles for the second time to make sure they're getting a consistent number. after that they'll start writing on a white board. they're going to write on the white board who has done, who has done well. there are speakers here talking as well. i'm going to

rick santorum quickly turning to e

rick santorum very smart tonight. focused on blue collar economics, not so much the cultural issues. can he make an end road on the economy? newt gingrich also has a lot to prove. he has one week to prove he has staying power if he comes in behind ron paul and behind mitt romney and conceivably, behind rick santorum. so gingrich has a lot to prove here. santorum has a lot to prove here. ron paul had 10% in iowa four years ago. he built it up over 20%. 8% in new hampshire for ron paul, four years ago, a big test to see whether he can grow. and then state number three in the republican process is a state that is decisive. delegates matter if this goes on for weeks and weeks. sometimes, momentum decides the nomination. if somebody can win two out of the first three or three out of the first three, it can end quickly. you get into south carolina by the orange, the huckabee vote, much more hospitable to a christian conservative candidate. governor perry's decision to go home and reassess could be a benefit to rick santorum

romney way down there after rick santorum. but among the larger groups, gingrich, gingrich and gingrich. he keeps winning. here's one more. some thought there would be a gender gap. there was no gender gap. gingrich 38%, romney, 29%. he won among women. and the question, you can see here this is newt gingrich. that is a picture of a thumping. look at 2008 when john mccain barry carried the state. he won 33% to 30% over mike huckabee. tonight, newt gingrich winning convincingly. the question is, can he take the demographic support among tea party voters and evangelicals and bring it into a much more different state here. this is mccain the lighter red, mike huckabee the yellow. four years ago. romney got 31% last time but mccain won the state. again, a lot of lessons. you can discount because of the size of the gingrich victory or say governor romney has a problem as he moves on. >> we have ten days between now and january 31 when the florida primary takes place. you think how quickly things can change, only a week or so, not e

rick santorum, 20%. michele bachmann very high. >> michele bachmann has traveled to all 99 counties in the state. so has rick santorum. i bet ron paul is pretty close. these are the people who spent the most time in the state. iowans feel like they know them. i mean, you saw rick santorum. he's been traveling around in a truck with his chief of staff and they're kind of hanging out in every county. you look at the person, though, the question, who best relates, mitt romney only 10% to iowans. "a," he hasn't been there a lot. "b," even when he's there, they know him from 2008. he didn't do so well in 2008, so there are still these reservations about him. >> this is going to be interesting here as we go through these questions. the next one i want to show -- by the way, i like that, how i just trash it. who is the most consistent. this is interesting. you also see santorum scoring about the same as mitt romney. >> sure. >> ron paul, i guess this isn't surprising, right? he has been very consistent over the

down with cholesterol. >>> back with senator rick santorum. we left with a cliffhanger there where you were mulling over the nuances of -- with all the evidence we now have, would you have gone to war in iraq? >> no question that knowing what we know, i think uh i did the right thing. i'm not rethinking and i want to make it clear. i'm not rethinking my vote on iraq. i stand by that vote. i think it was the right thing to do at the time. >> knowing what we know now -- >> because of iraq. >> you agree with pulling troops out of iraq. >> well, no. you have to finish the mission to success. >> do you think the mission was finished? >> the mission was partially finished. >> if you become president in november would you put troops back in? >> you can't reintroduce troops into a country where we have left and abandoned the mission. i'm not going to invade iraq again with american troops. >> so the genie is out of the bottle. >> you have to deal with the situation as it is. >> would you be prepared to put boots on the ground in iraq? >> no. >> how yo

rick santorum, steady eddie, the real conservative. >> that's a good analysis of the race. the interesting thing is ultimately you want a candidate who's not just steady eddie, but has a vision for the country and one that's deeply held and can be articulated. when the other side comes after us which they will. they'll come after all of us. whoever the nominee is will be the most conservative person ever to run for the presidency after president obama's people go after them. wouldn't it be someone who felt comfortable with that? >> rupert murdoch tweeted that you were the guy with the big ideas. quite a significant moment i would say that the man who owns fox news almost put his hand on your shoulder. >> i think if you look at our record, our plans, number one, they're consistent. i wasn't for something and changed my mind for something else. i have a solid understanding of american first principles, how 'america works well and how to solve our problems from the bottom up. i put forward plans and ideas that are based on that. i count to articulate those things. i would say

. >>> tonight on the eve of the south carolina primary, rick santorum as you have never seen him before. >> how many times have you been properly in love before you met her? >> never. >> never? >> no. >> does he have a prayer of being president? he says he's the only candidate who stands up for values no matter what. >> i will be there fighting for the convictions i have deeply held. >> rick santorum on newt gingrich and mitt romney. >> romney and gingrich were on the wrong side of the issue. >> and how he plans to beat barack obama. >> make the election about barack obama and his policy. it's about him. >> plus, for the first time rick santorum's wife karen and four of his children join us. >> my two younger boys said you can't run because you won't be able to coach baseball. >> this is the piers morgan interview. starts now. >>> good evening. i'm in charleston, south carolina, 24 hours to go before the crucial south carolina primary. who better to talk to than rick santorum, a man who has just discovered he won the iowa caucuses when everybody thought mitt romney had. he's edging thir

and rick santorum winning officially in iowa. this is going to be find of fun as we move on. >> how angry are you guys about what happened in iowa? had you been able to be declared the outright winners, it would have made a big difference for your ability to raise money and perhaps to do more ads in south carolina and so on. it's like a domino effect, isn't it? >> well, the real interesting thing about iowa was that we spent by far the least amount of money and as we know officially yesterday won it. what it tells me more importantly is that in america it's not about who spends the most but who has the most compelling message and messenger. it should have been great if we had more gres and so forth, but we still raised significant money coming out of iowa. there's only three people left on the island, if you will, and we're one of them. we're excited about where we are. >> at one point, though, does the campaign hit the buffers in the sense that at some stage, there is going to have to be a two-horse race. everybody knows the ron

to mitt romney and to rick santorum. rick santorum played a pretty clever game. he just put all his eggs in iowa. he went to 370-odd rallies in 99 counties. an amazing feat of endurance, if nothing else. i think he's earned his right to have his day in the sun. but as more scrutiny comes on him now, do you think he'll be able to withstand the inevitable media attention that he will now get for what many would say are policies which in some cases go to the more extreme right? >> well, you know, my criticism isn't that he's an extreme conservative. i think he spends way too much money. when he had the opportunity to double the size of the department of education, he did. when he expanded medical care with prescription drug programs, and when he votes for foreign aid, he votes for all these things. his support of people like arlen specter. he doesn't come across as a conservative. i think that will get out. he sort of popped up in the polls at the last minute. but he didn't have an organization. and his -- if you look at a picture of his rallies, they were very, ver

santorum, rick perry and michele bachmann sbaurming the state. today alone they've had more than two dozen events and done innumerable interviews. participants who say they might still change their minds. jon huntsman says forget iowa. i'll concentrate on new hampshire. the man with the most on the line in iowa may well be newt gingrich. the former front-runner actually did something pretty unusual today. he told voters he'll probably lose tomorrow's caucuses, which is a revolutionary strategy in politics called honesty. joining me now newt gingrich. mr. speaker, how are you? >> i'm doing great. how you are? >> i'm good. it seems like all the focus has been on you, good, bad and ugly in the last few weeks. how are you faring with the battle so far? >> well, i think pretty well. i enjoy being with the people of iowa. i enjoy talking about ideas and solutions and where we are as a country. we've had huge crowds. we've also done telephone conference calls with up to 22,000 people at a time. so it's been fun. it's been very exciting. things are comin

it was another nick and tuck night for rick santorum. last week it was nip and tuck for first place. today nip and tuck for fourth place. a lot of rationalization from the santorum forces, but a lot of it is honest and practical. he was saying before new years, the polls here in new hampshire had him at 1% or 2% or 3%, he ended up with 9%. he attributes it from momentum from his near victory in iowa. he also said he didn't spen a lot of money here. that, too, is accurate. he's now on his way to south carolina to campaign tomorrow, and he said and his people say they're putting most of their eggs in the south carolina basket. wolf. >> all right, gary. thanks very much. joe johns, thanks to you. let's go to erin and gloria. they're taking a closer look at the numbers. new hampshire is different from south carolina, but what did we see in new hampshire. >> different from south carolina and different than iowa. we wanted to hone in on two important categories. opinion on the tea party movement. we were talking about whether mitt romney can w

so i -- you know, i think rick santorum is a fanatic. that's just my opinion. let him run for president and no matter who the president -- >> even though you disagree with him on these core issues, do you have more respect for somebody who like him, who at least is consistent on his principles, even if you don't agree with him, than somebody like a mitt romney, who has been a legendary flip-flopper, apparently changing his principle positions for political expediency. >> if you told me -- if rick santorum said, here's what i'm going to do, i'd be much more likely to believe him than many others. it's the reason i wouldn't support him. >> but do you have more respect for politicians at least true to themselves? >> this is again where words get into our conditioning. respect -- do i respect somebody who would sit beside me and tell me he wouldn't respect my daughter's choice, no, i don't think i would respect him. >> let's turn to haiti. everybody knows your commitment to haiti. it's been quite extraordinary. i've spoken to many people who tell me details about t

rick santorum, 19%. newt gingrich, 18. ron paul, 12. rick perry, 5. and huntsman at 1%. we know newt gingrich will spend $3.5 billion. this is the first big financial assault on mitt romney and i'm interviewing newt gingrich for the hour tomorrow. it will be fascinating because he's got rid of a halo. the nice-guy stuff wasn't working. >> i'm not sure he ever wore the halo. he's going to go for it through the super pac? isn't he? >> well, there is that wall between them, right? look, i think newt gingrich never really wore the hey halo. he had no choice but to be positive and he didn't have the super pac money. now he has the super pac and he's been attacked by mitt romney's super pac mercilessly. talk about it getting personal! i think it is getting personal. early on in the debates, gingrich didn't really criticize mitt romney. he always kind of said, no, no, no, mitt romney is a good man. and i was thinking, maybe he wants to be in the cabinet at some point, who knows? now, now -- now he's the man leading the charge against mitt romney and by the way, leading the char

rick santorum, jon huntsman tied. maybe an iowa bounce for rick santorum. but certainly jon huntsman has been pitching to the undeclared voters, the independents, and our poll showed that 56% of the voters still had not made up their minds. there is a big and declared out there and it will be interesting to see which way they swing and hopefully, it will be to :30 in the morning like it was an iowa before we get the results. >> thank you for joining us. there you have a, basically the result, the first voting results in hashers primary canning and right there, a tie between jon huntsman and mitt romney. we will wait to see until tomorrow how both of the campaigns spin that but the primary, the rest of the primary voting begins and continues tomorrow. "piers morgan tonight" starts in a few moments. the "i'll sleep when it's done" academic. for 80 years, we've been inspired by you. and we've been honored to walk with you to help you get where you want to be. ♪ because your moment is now. let nothing stand in your way. learn more at keller.edu. ♪ tell me w

same thing with rick santorum. but i think the attack that they are leveling against romney is not only an unfair attack, i think it's an attack that hurts what republicans stand for, which is a free market economy. >> and you're talking specifically about both of them coming out about this bain -- >> oh, yeah. the issues about romney care, perfectly fair, the issues about romney was pro-choice, now he's pro-life. those are all fair game. you can agree or disagree with them. but this idea that he was doing something wrong at bain capital by investing in companies that were in trouble trying to save those companies. and some of them work and some of them didn't work is totally crazy. this is what we want in our economy. this is precisely what's not going on now in our economy that's keeping jobs down. >> hasn't mitt romney brought this on himself by wording i like firing people. we all know what he really meant and most people would agree with what he was saying about insurance and so on. when you got, i think 8.5%