It’s been a pretty wild ride for Newt Gingrich who – let’s not forget – looked set to crater in the summer of 2011 after revelations about the size of his Tiffany’s credit line, and the defection of key staffers to some guy from Texas called Rick Perry.
And yet, here he is, basking in the victory of South Carolina and vowing to take his campaign all the way to the GOP convention.
Clearly he’s got a certain something – but what? What do his backers see in him?
TPM put this question to dozens of Newt voters on the trail over the last month, from Iowa to Florida, and a few major themes emerged.
First off, probably nothing has been more important to Gingrich than his debate performances. And, in perhaps the smartest messaging move of his campaign, Gingrich decided to make them the centerpiece of his argument against Romney, saying he’ll challenge Obama to a series of Lincoln Douglas debates in which he’ll expose the president as the Saul Alinsky-loving empty suit Republicans know he is. “I’ll let him use TelePrompter, I’ll rely on knowledge, we’ll do just fine,” Gingrich said in the most recent debate.
Supporters, especially after South Carolina’s epic CNN-bashing debate, constantly mention how “articulate” and “knowledgeable” Gingrich is on the debate stage. It’s a crucial part of Newt’s surge in that it allows Republicans to disregard myriad polls showing Romney in a stronger position against Obama — after all, what does his polling in January matter if he’s just going to wilt on that debate stage?
“The intellectual depth he shows in the debates,” one 44-year old Manchester, NH supporter who works in the computer industry told TPM. “Most of the others don’t have the same depth or detail.”
Dr. Patrick Fuller, a precinct captain for Newt in Brevard County, FL, attributed an explosion in volunteers to Gingrich’s South Carolina debate performance, and several other Florida voters told TPM they only turned to Newt after that event.
“It was building before South Carolina, but that was the jewel on the cake — Newt ought to buy [debate moderator] John King a steak dinner,” he said.
Newt’s allies have certainly noticed the strength of the argument: pro-Gingrich Super PAC Winning Our Future cut this memorable ad imagining a hypothetical Romney vs. Obama matchup.
A big advantage Gingrich has over Romney is that he’s much more willing to name-check many of the anti-Obama arguments favored by the Tea Party that are too politically incorrect for the frontrunner to touch. Gingrich frequently warns of creeping Sharia law, calls Obama a “food stamp president,” and credits the president’s decision-making to his “Kenyan anti-colonial” ideology. Even for a Republican candidate, Gingrich’s voters skew elderly, the wing of the party most susceptible this kind of language.
“When Obama knelt with the Muslims of New York City, I knew we had something bad going on — he really scares me,” Tina Skipper, a retired schoolteacher in Jacksonville, told TPM at a Gingrich town hall. “Romney’s a good candidate, so is Paul, but they’re not strong enough to counteract Obama. Gingrich will say what’s really going on and not flinch.”
“The threat from Muslims — I think the others shy around it,” Eileen Loney, an accountant also attending the event, TPM.
It’s not that Romney doesn’t try to play to Republican’s darker fears — he frequently describes the country as being transformed into some kind of unrecognizable European dystopia — but Gingrich has been doing this a long time and it clearly comes more naturally. This sense that Newt understands the enemy’s true nature helps feed a belief that Romney just doesn’t have what it takes to fend off the worst of what’s coming.
“Everybody’s becoming dependent,” a retired manufacturing entrepreneur in Cocoa, FL told TPM “Are the blacks going to vote for Newt or Romney? The Hispanics? The unions? The teachers? The only way to win is to get someone articulate who can turn out conservatives while the others stay home. But if everyone ends up being subsidized voters, we’re dead.”
“I’m looking for someone who is going to be able to withstand the leftist onslaught,” Richard Spalding, an Orlando voter leaning towards Newt, told TPM. “He’s got the grit and I’m not sure Mitt does. Romney just is too gentlemanly. ”
Another thing voters often responded to in Gingrich’s speeches and debates: specifics. Even if they don’t necessarily agree with everything he says, many attendees at his events give him strong credit for at least offering up the full details of, say, his tax plan while Romney will only promise some vague future tax overhaul. Perhaps it’s not his finest political moment, but Gingrich devoting a whole day to an elaborate plan to build a lunar colony is the kind of thing Romney, who usually sticks to his safe “America The Beautiful”-quoting stump speech, would not likely do.
“He doesn’t speak in platitudes,” Carlos Gonzales, a State Rep. in Manchester who is supporting Gingrich, told TPM. “He’s talking straight about the issues, the economy, immigration”
Finally, there’s a strong backlash against the questions surrounding Gingrich’s personal lives. Many voters volunteered that they were upset to see it becoming an issue.
“I’m not worried about his past, we’ve all made some mistakes,” one Newt leaner in Florida told Romney surrogate Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) on the trail. “I’m worried about the future.”
“It’s a 10 year-old deal,” one South Carolina voter, who identified herself as a “scorned woman” told TPM. “Move on and get over it.”
