I was just asking our team of reporters what they’d heard today from on the ground in South Carolina. Turnout? Indicators? Whatever. The upshot was, not much. Average or maybe below average turnout. And in truth, these anecdotal indicators from the day of an election are more often wrong than not. But it reminded me of one of the big differences between the 2012 Republican cycle and the 2008 Democratic cycle — one of things people forget when they imagine that a drawn out primary battle automatically energizes a party. Read More

We thought we had the final TPM Poll Average of South Carolina late last night when PPP reported its final results. But ARG just published what will presumably be the final poll. And it has Gingrich up over Romney by 14 points.

That brings the final TPM Poll Average to Gingrich 37.6%, Romney 26.2%, Paul 15% Santorum 13.5%.

Final (presumably final) trend chart after the jump … Read More

It’s 6:52 PM. The folks on CNN seem to be falling over themselves signaling that they think they’re going to be able to call the race at 7PM. To be clear, not saying it explicitly. But sort of over the top, if you ask me. But in any case, all signs point to at least a solid win by Newt Gingrich which strike like a thunderclap over the GOP and the presidential primaries. We’ll know a lot more in a moment.

We’ll have the live county by county results live right here.

Okay, pretty much all the nets calling it for Gingrich right out of the box. Exit polls suggest a 9 point margin.

7:09PM: Live South Carolina results, county by county, right here.

7:12 PM: Live news updates on the results.

According to the exit polls, Mitt Romney lost all income levels with the exception of those making over $200,000 a year.

A number of TPM Readers referenced this today in emails. And moments ago, Brit Hume made a similar argument. For Hume it was making sense of the exit polls which appear to show that people didn’t just like Newt Gingrich better than Romney. They think Newt would be the stronger general election candidate too. Now, all the available poll data suggests that’s very wrong. So why the disconnect? Read More

Get every little detail out of South Carolina tonight on TPMLiveWire.

Live county by county voting results right here.

David Bossie, notorious or legendary GOP hatchet man depending on your tastes, tells TPM that Romney needs to stop attacking the “eventual nominee” Newt Gingrich.

To understand where this campaign is right now, these numbers are almost important as tonight’s results. Maybe more.