Huckabee Complicates GOP Contest

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The Candidates React-- Huckabee

Presidential candidate former Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-Ark.) addresses his supporters after the Super Tuesday primary election results filter in.

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But McCain aides and Republican strategists saw Huckabee's surprising strength as the end of the line for Romney, who has been unable to turn anti-McCain sentiments to his benefit. After his performance yesterday, Huckabee will stay in the race and will continue to take votes from the Republican Party's anti-McCain right wing, said Alex Vogel, a GOP strategist not affiliated with any of the presidential campaigns.

Huckabee intends to focus efforts on Texas, where Romney is hoping for a win. Louisiana and Kansas will also be on his target list, aides said.

"If Huckabee really won Alabama, Georgia, Arkansas, West Virginia and Tennessee, he has effectively sealed off the right flank from Romney," Vogel said.

Romney limped out of Super Tuesday with enough strength to keep fighting.

"This campaign's going on," he proclaimed last night.

Wins in Massachusetts and the mountain West -- and a close race in California -- may be enough to keep him going, even if he winds up in third place in the delegate count. Having put more than $35 million of his money into his White House run, Romney was expected by no one to walk away now.

"No matter what anyone thinks, Romney is going to keep running," said Charlie Black, a senior McCain adviser. "That's fine. It's a free country. We need to get closer to the magic number before we start asking people to get out."

But with the field narrowing, Romney advisers said they must count on an anti-McCain brush fire -- fanned by conservative talk show hosts and personalities -- to burst into an inferno for Romney to make his move. Romney aides hope he will win big in the next round, when Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia open their polling places only to registered Republicans, depriving McCain of his independent support.

Wisconsin and Washington state will be open to independents Feb. 19, but they will award their delegates proportionately. Next up are Texas, Vermont and Rhode Island, where conservatives and New Englanders can be expected to go to Romney, the aides said. And by then, anti-McCain voices, such as Rush Limbaugh and James Dobson, could be pulling conservatives to Romney.

"Evangelicals and talk show hosts had been saying unkind things about McCain. Now, they're going to be gathering around Romney," said Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), a strong Romney backer. "I think the longer it goes on, the better."

After Huckabee's wins yesterday, Rollins scoffed at that calculus. It may be a two-man race now, he said, but the third wheel is no longer from Arkansas.

"At the end of the day, this is where Republicans have to win, and if [Romney] can't attract significant support in the South, he has nowhere to go," Rollins said. "Romney's going to have to make the hard judgment . . . whether he has the money to keep spending like he is -- or whether he wants to keep spending it."