By Parveen Chopra, IANS
New York : Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, scored his first major primary victory Tuesday in his native Michigan state, reviving his bid for Republican candidacy in the US presidential election.
“It’s a victory of optimism over Washington-style pessimism. The people of Michigan said they believe in someone who is going to fight for them,” he said after his victory.
“Washington is broken, and we’re going to do something about it.”
Multi-millionaire Romney had finished second to Mike Huckabee in the Iowa caucuses and to John McCain in the New Hampshire primary despite his heavy campaigning and big budget advertising in each state.
In Michigan, with most precincts counted, Romney won convincingly, with 39 percent of the vote while his nearest rival was McCain with 30 percent. Huckabee was third with 16 percent. No other Republican reached double digits.
In a change of strategy, Romney shifted campaign resources out of South Carolina, where the primary is due in four days, into Michigan last week. He also emphasised his family ties to the state where his father, George Romney, was three-term governor in the 1960s and had headed American Motors Corp.
Romney was headed next to South Carolina and then to Nevada, both states voting Jan 19. While he has trailed in South Carolina polling, he has been the only Republican candidate to pay attention to Nevada.
Neither Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama nor John Edwards campaigned in Michigan, where party officials defied the Democratic National Committee by holding the primary so early in the campaign season.
As a result, the election was a bit farcical, because Clinton was the only major candidate who entered the race. She faced competition principally from the “uncommitted” line on the ballot, an option that Obama and Edwards urged their supporters to take.
With most precincts counted, Clinton had 56 percent of the vote, much more than the 39 percent for uncommitted delegates to the Democratic National Convention.
Clinton and Obama are the two clear frontrunners on the Democratic side – Obama won the Iowa caucuses and Clinton made a comeback by winning the New Hampshire primary.
The Republican field for the party’s next presidential candidate is still wide open.