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TAMPA, Fla. — Mitt Romney dealt Newt Gingrich a body blow in the Florida GOP primary last night, thumping the former speaker by double digits and snatching the biggest delegate prize yet in a show of overwhelming force.
Romney snatched the Sunshine State’s 50 Republican Convention delegates in the winner-take-all contest, while also getting a huge jolt of momentum for his White House bid, which found a more focused, forceful tone during a brutal week of campaign combat.
With 99 percent of precincts reporting, Romney led Gingrich 46 to 32 percent, followed by Rick Santorum at 13 and Ron Paul at 7.
Romney thanked Floridians for a “great victory” and told a cheering crowd of supporters last night: “A competitive primary does not divide us. It prepares us. And when we gather here in Tampa seven months from now for our convention, ours will be a united party with a winning ticket for America.”
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Gingrich’s campaign was left reeling, and the former House speaker is now in the difficult position of having to grind his way through several contests in February where he’ll be playing catch-up with Romney’s campaign juggernaut.
“It is now clear that this will be a two-person race between the conservative leader Newt Gingrich and the Massachusetts moderate,” Gingrich told his supporters last night, vowing to fight on.
There isn’t another scheduled candidate debate until Feb. 22, depriving Gingrich of an opportunity to punch back and leaving him vulnerable to more of the pounding he took on the Florida airwaves.
Shortly after the results became known, the Romney campaign was told by the Secret Service that starting this week he will receive protection.
The network, quoting sources, said that was not because of a specific threat, but because the crowd size at his events has grown.
The only other candidate known to have received Secret Service protection was Herman Cain before he dropped out. Cain had gotten death threats.
In Florida, Romney had been aided by a huge campaign-cash advantage in the state — deployed in the form of relentless attacks orchestrated by a stronger campaign organization, despite Gingrich’s surge in momentum after his big win in the Jan. 21 South Carolina primary.
Romney and a pro-Romney super PAC outspent Gingrich and a pro-Gingrich super PAC by 4to1, drowning Newt in negative ads that he complained were “profoundly false.”
Romney displayed a much more aggressive posture here after Gingrich’s South Carolina win put Romney back on his heels, and even had Gingrich leading in the polls more than a week ago.
Last night, Romney cleaned up in the population centers of Jacksonville, Orlando, Tampa and Miami. Gingrich, one of whose ex-wives accused him in South Carolina of having wanted an “open marriage,” lost the Florida women’s vote by 51-29.
Romney ratcheted up his attacks and turned in strong performances in two Florida debates, while Gingrich acknowledged that his own performance was “flat.”
Two in three voters said the debates were an important factor in their vote. The rivals split the support of Tea Party supporters.
“It’s not so much what Newt did. It’s that Mitt Romney — he was a different man in Florida. He’s being himself. He’s connecting,” former Miami Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart told The Post.
Asked if Romney looked like the eventual winner, Doug Heye, a former communications director for the Republican National Committee, said: “The stars are certainly aligning toward that,” adding that Gingrich faces a “very tough road ahead.”
Additional reporting by S.A. Miller