The InsiderAdvantage poll of likely South Carolina Republican primary voters released Thursday shows Republican presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich in a tight race to win the Palmetto state’s January 21st primary election.
Mr. Romney garnered 23 percent of the voters, while Mr. Gingrich trails him closely at 21 percent.
“Romney and Gingrich are even among those who identify themselves as ‘Republicans’ in South Carolina. Among those who call themselves ‘Independent’, Paul leads at 29 percent, but Gingrich and Romney are not far behind,” said Matt Towery, CEO of InsiderAdvantage.
The poll also shows former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum and Texas congressman Ron Paul in a close race for third. Mr. Santorum garnered 14 percent, while Mr. Paul finished with 13 percent of the votes.
The new poll was released after several days of attacks on the front running Mr. Romney from Mr. Gingrich and Texas Governor Rick Perry. On Wednesday, Winning Our Future, a Super PAC that supports Mr. Gingrich, released a 28 minute video called “When Mitt Romney Came to Town,” profiling the work he did with Bain Capital.
Mr. Perry called Mr. Romney a “vulture capitalist” during a campaign stop in Lexington, South Carolina on Wednesday. The Texas governor finished the InsiderAdvantage poll in last place, raking in 5 percent of the votes, two percentage points behind former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman.
According to Mr. Towery, Mr. Gingrich does better with male voters and Mr. Romney does better among female voters, likely a result of the former House speaker’s three marriages.
Still, the poll is quite an improvement for Mr. Gingrich over a Public Polling Policy poll of South Carolina voters released prior to the New Hampshire primary that showed Mr. Romney at 30 percent and Mr. Gingrich at 23 percent.
It will be interesting to see if Mr. Gingrich’s aggressive ad campaign against the former Massachusetts governor will sway more South Carolina voters toward him prior to casting their votes next week.
“This is, for the moment, a two person race, made up of Romney and Gingrich, who are statistically tied. The question is whether their strategies and actions will break the race in on direction of the other in the next week and three days,” said Mr. Towery.
The poll was conducted on January 11th among 726 likely South Carolina Republican primary voters with a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.
