“My record is out there pleased with it,” Mr. Romney said. “I assume that if people need to have someone who understands how the economy works, having worked in the real economy, then I’m the guy that may best post up against Barack Obama.”
But from the instant the controversy began, Mr. Romney was besieged by his opponents, all of whom are trying to survive the winnowing method of the early primaries and emerge as a singular challenger to him. They pointedly called on him to disclose his tax returns, explain whether his corporate buyout firm Bain Capital had created or killed jobs and account for his evolving views on social issues like abortion.
“Mitt, we need for you to release your income tax so that the people of this country will see how you created your money,” said Gov. Rick Perry of Texas. “As Republicans, we cannot hearth our nominee in September. we need to know currently.”
Mr. Romney, a multimillionaire who has declined to release returns that might shed new lightweight on the tax rate that he pays, said he would think about reversing course. but he said he would not do so till April, by that purpose the Republican competition can be over.
Newt Gingrich, a former House speaker, defended the withering criticism he has helped lead of Mr. Romney’s business background. Mr. Gingrich said he was not attacking yank capitalism and, if something, was fulfilling a duty to the party so it knew its nominee’s vulnerabilities before creating a final alternative about who should face Mr. Obama in the general election.
“We ought to satisfy the country,” Mr. Gingrich said, “that whoever we nominate incorporates a record that may rise up to Barack Obama during a} very effective approach.”
Here in South Carolina, the third stop in the Republican nominating contest, the airwaves are crammed with ads from candidates and teams called “super PACS” that support the candidates while not being directly tied to their campaigns. The advertisements provoked a series of spirited exchanges between Mr. Romney and his rivals.
Mr. Gingrich sarcastically dismissed Mr. Romney’s protestations that he had nothing to try to to with an excellent PAC ad attacking Mr. Gingrich. He said Mr. Romney’s defense “makes you marvel how much influence he would have if he were president.”
In reply, Mr. Romney said the outside cluster supporting Mr. Gingrich was showing an anti-Romney documentary that has been widely criticized for its misleading claims about Mr. Romney’s work at Bain Capital. He called it “probably the largest hoax since Bigfoot.”
Yet Mr. Gingrich, who is trailing Mr. Romney narrowly in some polls here, was in prime debate kind and infrequently appeared to overshadow Rick Santorum, who is battling Mr. Gingrich to emerge as a additional conservative alternative to Mr. Romney.
In fact, Mr. Gingrich won a number of his loudest and most sustained applause when the liberal Fox News analyst Juan Williams pressed him on his call for schoolchildren to figure as janitors, for his description of Mr. Obama as a “food stamp president” and remarks that Mr. Williams said, to loud boos, appeared “intended to belittle the poor.”
At one purpose rolling his eyes, cocking his head to the aspect and saying with mock impatience, “Well, 1st of all, Juan,” Mr. Gingrich appeared to revel in using Mr. Williams as a foil.
“The fact is additional people have been put on food stamps by Barack Obama than any president in yank history,” Mr. Gingrich said, a claim that is numerically true but ignored the depth of the recession that Mr. Obama inherited when he took office. “I recognize that among the politically correct, you’re not supposed to use facts that are uncomfortable.”
The field of Republican candidates had been narrowed to 5 as they gathered for their sixteenth debate of the first campaign. Former Gov. Jon M. Huntsman Jr. of Utah bowed out of the race on Monday morning and offered an endorsement of Mr. Romney.
The departure of Mr. Huntsman underscored the rising urgency facing Mr. Romney’s rivals, who are trying to vary the race’s trajectory. but that failed to seem to happen throughout the controversy, that was sponsored by Fox News Channel, The Wall Street Journal and the South Carolina Republican Party. while many voters say they're open to changing their minds, Mr. Romney holds considerable advantages in South Carolina and in Florida, following primary state.
The discussion typically appeared to be directed at a Southern audience, with queries dedicated to what Mr. Perry termed a “war on faith,” likewise as race and labor relations.
In a debate that fell on Martin Luther King’s Birthday, the Republicans additionally found themselves arguing about whether convicted felons should be able to regain the right to vote after they have completed their prison sentences and parole. the problem has long been of concern to black leaders, given the disproportionate range of African-American men who serve prison terms.
Mr. Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, said he thought they should regain voting rights underneath those conditions, defending a position he had taken in the Senate. Mr. Romney, once considerable pushing by Mr. Santorum, said he thought that violent felons should never regain the right to vote.
At that moment, Mr. Santorum who seemed to have anticipated what Mr. Romney was reaching to say responded by asking why as governor of Massachusetts he never did something to touch upon a state law that permitted felons to vote even while they were on parole.
The debate only drove home the sense that the rough-and-tumble tone of the campaign was reaching to continue well into the first Southern primary on Saturday which Mr. Romney’s rivals were in no mood however to fall in line behind him. When Representative Ron Paul of Texas was asked what he thought about Mr. Huntsman’s call for additional intraparty civility, Mr. Paul said his only regret about his negative ads was that “I couldn’t get all the items in I needed to mention in one minute.”
But Mr. Paul appeared on the defensive when the questioning turned to national security. during a state with an important military presence, he drew a number of the strongest negative reactions from the audience. He was booed loudly when he spoke about an yank foreign policy based upon the “golden rule” of “don’t do to different nations what we don’t need them to try to to to us.”
The answer was in response to an issue of whether to enter Pakistan militarily if there was actionable intelligence that the Taliban leader Mullah Muhammad Omar was there.
Mr. Romney, on the opposite hand, replied, “We go anywhere they're, and that we kill ’em.”
While Mr. Romney came prepared to beat back against attacks that have become acquainted throughout the long series of debates, it absolutely was clear that he additionally was making an attempt to rally Republicans around his candidacy. He was significantly conciliatory, going out of his thanks to note his agreement together with his fellow Republicans onstage.
First Thoughts: Newt-mentum returns?
This new poll, conducted Jan. 13-17, reflects the narrowing race in South Carolina just days before voting in the state, where Romney hopes to pull off victory after having won both previous nominating contests in Iowa and New Hampshire. Completing that kind of trifecta could allow Romney to drive his opponents from the race.
The poll is also reflective of the closing momentum Gingrich is enjoying in South Carolina on the strength of more pointed criticism of Romney and other GOP foes. Gingrich also won praise for a strong showing in Monday night's debate, a performance he's hoping to duplicate in a debate on Thursday evening.
Gingrich's surge, though, has also prompted the Romney campaign to revive its offensive against the former House speaker in hopes of parrying his momentum before voting this weekend.
To that end, 35 percent of likely primary voters said they might change their mind on a candidate before Saturday, versus 57 percent who said they will definitely vote for the candidate for whom they expressed support in the poll.
Rounding out the field in South Carolina are Santorum at 16 percent, Texas Rep. Ron Paul at 13 percent and Texas Gov. Rick Perry at 6 percent.
NBC News and Marist College will release the results of a new poll conducted jointly on Thursday morning.
Looking ahead to the next primary, Florida's Jan. 31 primary, Romney enjoys an even stronger advantage, according to CNN/TIME/ORC figures also released Wednesday.
Forty-three percent of registered Republicans likely to vote in the Florida primary (which is limited to Republicans) said they back Romney. His next-closest competitors are Santorum at 19 percent and Gingrich at 18 percent. Nine percent of Florida Republicans would vote for Paul, who's not competing in the contest, while just 2 percent plan to vote for Perry.
The Florida poll, which was also conducted Jan. 13-17, has a 5 percent margin of error. The sample of likely South Carolina primary voters has a 4.5 percent margin of error.
