Filed under: Bill Clinton, John McCain, Newt Gingrich, Rudy Giuliani, dark horse
Little Rock, AR – Former AR Governor and Presidential Candidate Mike Huckabee received praise from politics’ ‘odd couple’ – former President Bill Clinton and former Speaker Newt Gingrich –who said Sunday, in separate interviews, that he is the most likely “dark horse candidate” to win the GOP nomination.
Huckabee, who now ranks fourth in Iowa among likely Republican Caucus-Goers, welcomed the positive comments, saying his 1st place win in the recent “Values Voter” poll – along with other significant developments, has buoyed his chances for victory.
Huckabee is now ahead of Sen. John McCain in Iowa and nearly tied with former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, according to a Sept. 29 Newsweek poll conducted with 1,215 Iowa registered voters by Princeton Survey Research Associates International on Sept. 26-27.
“The Newsweek poll reflects what we’ve been feeling on the ground for some time: that there is steady, upward momentum for my campaign in Iowa and New Hampshire , and other early primary states,” said Huckabee.
Filed under: Duncan Hunter, Fred Thompson, John McCain, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, Rudy Giuliani, Sam Brownback, Tancredo
In a posting last week, I looked at the Democratic contenders for president in 2008. As we head into the heart of the fall campaign leading up to the caucuses and primaries, let’s examine the Republican candidates.
RCP: As a social conservative who recently won the Palmetto State Straw poll, how do you explain trailing candidates like Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson in South Carolina?
Mike Huckabee: Well, the numbers that you’re talking about really are reflecting two things. One is the money being spent by the candidates on paid advertisements; two is the amount of exposure they’re getting and free media because of their celebrity status. But when we go head-to-head, I end up winning. So for us it’s always been about the trajectory of momentum which for us has been upward very consistently and if you look at some of the numbers of the so-called frontrunners, they’re polling behind where they themselves were before. Ours have continued to go up, they can continue to level off or slip backwards.
