Romney Wins Big In New Hampshire; Paul Is 2nd

01/11/2012 Mitt Romney has scored a big win in the 2012 New Hampshire Republican Presidential Primary yesterday evening, with the race having been called for him within minutes of the polls closing at 8:00 pm.

With 5% of precincts reportedly still unaccounted for, 95,669 votes were cast for the former Massachusetts Governor, representing 40% of the total ballots cast and reported. Four years ago in 2008, Mitt Romney only got 75,675 votes in New Hampshire in his second place finish. This year, therefore, he enjoyed a considerable percentage and numerical increase in the number of voters who cast ballots for him.

Well over 20,000 more voters turned out for Mitt this time around. Exact figures will be available as the last few precincts are reported.

As of 2:41 am CNN had posted numbers showing that, with 95% of precincts having reported, Romney had 95,669 votes for 40% of the total. Ron Paul was in second place with 55,455 votes (23%), and Jon Huntsman was in third place with 40,903 votes (17%). Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum were in a close scramble for 4th place, each with about 10% of the vote. Governor Rick Perry of Texas, was only drawing around 1% of the vote.

In 2008, Romney came in second behind Senator John McCain, having garnered (per the Sec'y of State on 01/11) 75,675 votes out of the total of 241,039 votes cast.

With 5% still unreported, and 239,708 votes already having been reported last night, that suggests that there is a possibility of an additional twelve thousand votes that will be added to the total.

So clearly, posted claims that it looked like he would come "in at 37-38%, with about the same total number of votes as in 2008" were and are inaccurate.

It also looks like the Newt Gingrich effort to attack Romney over his work at Bain, was being perceived by New Hampshire voters as an effort aimed at revenge, and at least so far, it has backfired. Newt finished well back in the pack.

A more recent attention-getting gimmick by the former Fannie Mae adviser will apparently feature him making an appearance at a homeownership rally down in South Carolina along with House Democrat Leadership big, Congressman James Clyburn.

That event will be held this coming Thursday.