Santorum Nets a Hat Trick
Updated from Feb. 7 with the latest results.
NEW YORK (
) -- Rick Santorum netted all three crucial state races Tuesday night as the former Pennsylvania senator dealt the latest surprising blow to front-runner Mitt Romney's campaign.
Santorum jumped to early victories against Romney in the Minnesota caucuses and the non-binding, so-called beauty contest in Missouri's primary, before he wrapped up a shocking win just past 1 a.m. EST on Wednesday in Colorado.
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"We won Colorado! About two minutes to announcement," a Santorum campaign source text messaged before state GOP Chair Ryan Call declared the result on
CNN
. "40%-35%; just got a call from the party chair at 98%
of precincts in," another source said before Call announced on
CNN
that Santorum had won by that exact amount against Romney.
Santorum won Minnesota with 45% of the vote followed by Ron Paul, Romney and Newt Gingrich at 27.1%, 16.9% and 10.7%, respectively, with 88.1% of precincts reporting, according to
The Associated Press
.
In Colorado, where Romney was expected to win handily, Santorum pulled the upset with 40.2% of the vote, followed by Romney at 34.9%, Gingrich at 12.8%, and Paul at 11.8%, the Colorado Republican Party said on its Web site with all precincts reporting.
Multiple news agencies reported that the former Pennsylvania senator had won the Missouri primary as he grabbed 55.2% of the vote and Romney and Paul trailed at 25.3% and 12.2%, respectively, with 80.7% of precincts reporting, according to the
AP
. Gingrich did not qualify for the Missouri primary ballot.
"Huge!" a Santorum operative in Missouri said in a text message after major news agencies projected the victory.
"I can't tell you who's gonna come out on top, but I think ... it will be packed together," former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, who works for Romney's campaign,
said in a Monday conference call. Pawlenty's cautious remarks seemed to foreshadow Tuesday's shuffle.
Santorum's campaign
had looked to score victories in Tuesday's races since his campaign uprooted early from the bitter Florida primary battle to
make inroads in Colorado, Minnesota and Missouri as they felt voters in these states would show more favor to the former senator's grass-roots style.
Romney, the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination, had been coming off two consecutive victories in Florida and Nevada, but Santorum's Tuesday sweep could be cause for concern.
Missouri's primary was a non-binding contest that has zero delegates at stake; the state holds its caucus in March. But Santorum campaign sources there brushed aside the downplaying of the state.
"Technically speaking, you're right, there are no delegates at stake here tomorrow, but it shows that there is another option and it forces the media and folks to look around and say, 'Hey, look, instead of Gingrich, this Santorum team is one to be reckoned with,'" the Santorum source said in an earlier interview.
Gingrich? Santorum's camp might again want to start thinking about Romney.
-- Written by Joe Deaux in New York.
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