Florida Votes; How Long Will GOP Race Last?; Romney Outspending Gingrich in Florida Ads
JOHN KING, CNN ANCHOR: We're watching the final primary votes being cast in Florida on this special edition of</s>JOHN KING, USA. WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: It's another big night in the Republican race and anything could still happen.</s>ANNOUNCER: Tonight: a Republican free-for-all on the biggest battleground yet.</s>NEWT GINGRICH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The message we should give Mitt Romney is, we aren't that stupid and you aren't that clever.</s>MITT ROMNEY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We could see an October surprise a day from Newt Gingrich.</s>ANNOUNCER: After three contests and three different winners, who will claim the next victory?</s>ROMNEY: This race is getting to be even morning interesting.</s>ANNOUNCER: It's Florida's choice. Newt Gingrich clawed his way back to the top in South Carolina.</s>GINGRICH: Governor Romney has an enormous amount of money, but we have an enormous number of people.</s>ANNOUNCER: Mitt Romney needs to drag him down.</s>ROMNEY: He's gone from pillar to post, almost like a pinball machine, which is highly erratic.</s>ANNOUNCER: It's a two-man grudge match in a four-man race.</s>RICK SANTORUM (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: There's a lot of folks who talk tough. What makes you tough is what is at your core.</s>REP. RON PAUL (R-TX), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: No way they're going to stop the momentum that we have started.</s>ANNOUNCER: Who will return to Florida this summer as the Republican nominee?</s>GINGRICH: I will go all the way to the convention. I expect to win the nomination.</s>SANTORUM: We're going to be in this race for a long time.</s>ANNOUNCER: Forget everything you thought you knew about the presidential field.</s>PAUL: This is the beginning of a long, hard slog.</s>ROMNEY: We're going to take back the White House. We're going to take back our country.</s>ANNOUNCER: The nomination is up for grabs. The conventional wisdom is out the window. And Florida will change the game again.</s>KING: Hello from the CNN Election Center. I'm John King. Most of the polling places across Florida close about one hour from now.</s>BLITZER: We have the most crews in position across the state including our correspondents at the candidates' headquarters and as always Anderson Cooper is here as well.</s>KING: We have brand-new exit poll information just in. We can show you now but we can't tell you who the people of Florida are voting for but we can tell you about the Florida electorate tonight. If you watch this, this is the first time we have a much more diverse electorate, a big Latino population -- 15 percent of those voting in the Republican primary today in the state of Florida are Latino, 82 percent white, a very small only one percentage are African-Americans. If you look down here at the breakdown by gender, 52 percent of the electorate today again in the big Republican Florida primary men, 48 percent are women. We come across here, look at ideology. This is very important. South Carolina was our last contest. A much more conservative electorate there. In Florida, 37 percent, the largest group describe themselves as somewhat conservative -- 34 percent of our voters today describe themselves as very conservative and 30 percent describe themselves as moderate to liberal. That's important, a distinction from South Carolina. The Tea Party movement was huge in Florida in 2010, big today as well -- 66 percent of those voting in this presidential primary describe themselves as Tea Party supporters -- 22 percent are neutral. Only 8 percent of the voters today oppose the Tea Party. Let's move on. This is very important here, evangelical born-again Christians, a big constituency in Iowa and a big constituency in South Carolina, a smaller constituency in Florida, 39 percent describe themselves as white born-again evangelicals. Six in 10 voters today say they don't fit that description there. Again if you look at the most important candidate quality, when Republicans went to the polls today we asked them what is the most important candidate quality, and 45 percent, the largest group by far, said can defeat President Obama. Florida of course will be a huge battleground state in November, as it always is -- 45 percent of Republicans today say quality number one, can they win the general election, can they defeat Barack Obama? -- 13 percent want a true conservative. Strong moral character was the number one quality for 17 percent. The right experience -- 20 percent of Republicans said the right experience was what mattered most to them. Let's take a little bit more about the electorate. Were the debates a factor in your vote? -- 86 percent of Republicans today said, yes, debates were a factor. How big a factor? Let's dig a little deeper here. An important factor, 50 percent. The most important factor, 17 percent. So 67 percent say important or most important. Minor factor, 19 percent -- 10 percent say the debates were not a factor at all. Let's take one more quick look here -- campaign ads, were they important to your vote? This is interesting. So much money spent on campaign ads. A lot of complaints from Speaker Gingrich about the campaign ads -- 34 percent say a minor factor, 24 percent say not a factor at all, so a majority there, 58 percent, say minor or not at all when it came to all the millions spent on campaign ads. Only 15 percent said it was the most important factor. One last footnote, who ran the most unfair campaign? If you listened in recent days, Speaker Gingrich was complaining about the negative ads. He said Mitt Romney was being dishonest. But the voters did not see it that way, at least not by a large margin -- 37 percent said Governor Romney ran the most unfair campaign -- 34 percent said that about Speaker Gingrich. Only a tiny percentage of voters said that about Rick Santorum and Ron Paul, Wolf.</s>BLITZER: John, thanks very much. Let's over to the Romney and Gingrich campaigns right now, and Candy Crowley is at the Romney headquarters. Jim Acosta is over at the Gingrich campaign headquarters. Candy, what are our Romney campaign advisers expecting for tonight?</s>CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, they will tell you, gee, a 6 or 7 percent margin. They're clearly expecting a victory. I have to tell you out in the hallway there are T-shirts with Florida on them that say Florida believes, and believe in America is Mitt Romney's slogan. So they are looking for a victory tonight. They say five or six points, but you have seen the polls and they have seen the polls. A double-digit victory would be great. But I have to tell you they are also looking at the breadth of a win should they get it. And that is particularly how do they do among women and how do they do among those very conservative voters that John is talking about, two key things for them as they watch tonight for a variety of reasons. And even though we are seeing that a lot of people say what was on the air here in terms of advertising didn't really affect their vote, I can also tell you just from what Mitt Romney is saying that he intends to continue to be not on the defense, but on the offense. Take a listen.</s>MITT ROMNEY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: If you're attacked, I'm not just going to sit back. I'm going to fight back, and fight back hard.</s>CROWLEY: So expect more of the same going on. This still is a heated battle. Both these men obviously going on after this, along with Santorum and Paul -- Wolf.</s>BLITZER: We will be checking back with you throughout the night, Candy. Thanks very much. Jim Acosta is over at Newt Gingrich headquarters. Jim, you had a chance to chat a bit with Newt Gingrich today. Where does he see this race moving after tonight?</s>JIM ACOSTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, Newt Gingrich likes to remind reporters that he's been dead before in this campaign twice. I had a chance to catch up with the former speaker out on the campaign trail earlier today. And I asked him is there still a chance for you to become the Republican nominee after what might be a pretty big beating down here in Florida? And he said, of course. Here's what he had to say.</s>ACOSTA: Mr. Speaker, do you still see a path to the nomination after Florida?</s>GINGRICH: Of course.</s>ACOSTA: How do you see that happening?</s>GINGRICH: Unify the conservatives. Romney is not going to get anywhere near a majority here. You unify the conservatives, you win the delegates and you have the nomination.</s>ACOSTA: Did you let your guard down to Mitt Romney, would you say?</s>GINGRICH: No, I would say that when you are outspent 5-1 with ads that are dishonest, that it's a challenge.</s>ACOSTA: And are you saying he's run a dishonest campaign, sir?</s>GINGRICH: Well, that's what "The Wall Street Journal" and "The National Review" said.</s>ACOSTA: As for that onslaught of negative ads, the former speaker does have some numbers to back him up. The folks over at Kantar, CMAG, have run an analysis of the ads run down here in Florida in the last week -- just 0.1 percent of the ads here in Florida in the last week have been pro-Romney. Nearly 70 percent have been anti-Gingrich. Those are tough numbers to beat, Wolf.</s>BLITZER: Very tough numbers. I see they're getting ready for the former speaker to deliver a speech where you are. We will check back with you. Jim Acosta, thanks very much. Anderson Cooper is with us every step of the way -- Anderson.</s>ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: That's right. And I'm here with chief political analyst Gloria Borger and senior political analyst David Gergen. Expectations for tonight, what are you all watching for?</s>GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: I'm really watching to see whether Romney can win an election with the support of the most conservative voters and the Tea Party, because even though we saw him win in New Hampshire, it was kind of his backyard. And we need to see whether he can really rally the conservative base of the party, the Tea Partiers who have been so skeptical about him in the past.</s>COOPER: How much has he been reaching out to them this time?</s>BORGER: He has been reaching out. He's been calling them on the telephone. He's been really soliciting them, which he hasn't actually done in the past. Of course, Newt Gingrich's entire candidacy is premised upon being the not-Romney, the most conservative, the heir to the Reagan legacy. So it will be interesting to see if Romney can actually get those conservatives on board.</s>DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: We introduced the show tonight by saying the nomination's up for grabs. To me the big question tonight is, will Romney grab it tonight? If he wins decisively, I think he will be much closer to that goal, if it's over 10 points, if it's double digits. This is the first major state that is a major battleground state in the general election. And a person who can win here and among Republicans is a more formidable candidate for the Republican Party.</s>COOPER: And the next couple of states are also probably in Romney's favor.</s>GERGEN: Exactly right. I think it's a major night to just test how broad, how deep is Romney's support. I was also surprised, Anderson, and we have been talking all week about this avalanche of negative ads. But voters seem to think the debates were more important to them in making up their minds than the ads. And that's not good news for Newt Gingrich, who had two lackluster debates here.</s>COOPER: Also, Senator Marco Rubio from Florida, very popular among Republicans in that state, talked about the results tonight. Let's show what he said.</s>SEN. MARCO RUBIO (R), FLORIDA: I think the winner of Florida is in all likelihood going to be the nominee of our party, and rightfully so. Florida is, as you said, is a mini America. Virtually every issue we want them to be conversant on and convincing on is an issue they have had to confront here in Florida.</s>COOPER: Is that a tacit endorsement of Mitt Romney, assuming he wins?</s>BORGER: Well, he's walked right up to the line, but he decided not to endorse. I think what he's saying is accurate about the state, which is that not only is it a battleground, but if you can win in Florida, you're likely to be the one winning the nomination. I mean, the Gingrich campaign if they don't win in Florida tonight, they're going to say only 5 percent of the delegates have been picked. It's a long slog. And we can go -- we can go all the way to the convention, which may be true. But the question is can they raise the money if they don't win tonight and will they have the momentum that Mitt Romney would be able to claim?</s>COOPER: And John King, as you mentioned earlier, this is the most diverse state we have yet to see a primary in.</s>KING: It is, Anderson, 15 percent of the electorate Latinos tonight, more moderate voters that. We are looking through this early election poll information now. We're going to take a look at the first snapshot of who's voting today and why and how issue number one, the economy, figures in. And we all know Florida, remember the hanging chad, has a history of ballot problems. We're going behind the scenes with our exclusive ballot cams to watch the voting. Later, the counting in real time.