BATON ROUGE, La. — Rick Santorum dominated the Louisiana Republican primary Saturday night as he continued his battle in the south to narrow the gap with frontrunner Mitt Romney.
With 52 percent of votes counted, Santorum was comprehensively leading the field with 49 percent, ahead of Romney on 26 percent. Newt Gingrich was placing third with 17 percent, while Ron Paul was polling at around six percent.
“Thank you for making a very clear and crisp statement,” Santorum said Saturday night, thanking his Louisiana supporters from a campaign event in Bellevue, Wis.
“You don’t believe … this race is over. You didn’t get the memo. We are still here, we are still fighting,” he added.
Following his speech, Santorum tweeted, “Thank you Louisiana! Our wins in state after state show voters want a trusted conservative to take on Obama.”
Santorum had led frontrunner Romney by a wide margin in the polls during the lead-up to the largely conservative Pelican State’s primary.
According to FOX News exit polls, Santorum did well with evangelical and conservative voters in Louisiana, and also edged out Romney among self-described moderate voters and those who consider the economy the most important issue.
The former Pennsylvania senator will be hoping to win a big share of the 20 delegates at stake and narrow the gap with Romney, whose decisive victory in Tuesday’s Illinois primary increased his lead in the delegate race.
The former Massachusetts governor has amassed more than twice as many delegates as Santorum nationwide and is nearly halfway to the 1,144 delegates needed to clinch the Republican presidential nomination.
Louisiana’s delegate rules dictate that candidates must receive at least 25 percent of the vote to be eligible for any of the delegates available Saturday night. Anyone who wins at least that receives a portion of the 20 delegates — doled out on a proportional basis.
Santorum has now won 11 states, while Romney has won 21 states or territories. Gingrich has won two states, while Paul has not won any.