Romney wins comfortably this time

Jonathan Jones 6:51am

Last night Mitt Romney became the first Republican, excluding sitting Presidents, to win both the Iowa Caucuses and the New Hampshire Primary. And unlike in Iowa last week, his supporters didn't have to wait until the next day to start celebrating. The exit polls were enough for Romney to be declared the winner within an hour of the voting booths closing. And now, with 95 per cent of the votes counted, he's secured about 39 per cent of the vote – slightly higher than the share McCain received in 2008, and 16 points ahead of Ron Paul this time.

Romney looks more the inevitable nominee than ever, and his victory speech (above) sounded very much like the start of his general election campaign. ‘Our campaign is about more than replacing a President,’ he declared. ‘It's about saving the soul of America.’ And he called on his fellow Republicans to unite behind him and stop the attacks on his career at Bain Capital:

‘President Obama wants to put free enterprise on trial, and in the last few days we've seen some desperate Republicans join forces with him. This is such a mistake for our party and for our nation. The country already has a leader who divides us with the bitter politics of envy. We must offer an alternative vision.’

Romney now heads to South Carolina, where the polls point to another win for him next week. In part, that's because the opposition to him on the right remains split between Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum. Neither has yet been able to vanquish the other and consolidate the anti-Romney vote, and last night did little to help. Gingrich looks set to finish fourth (as he did in Iowa) with 9.4 per cent of the vote, and Santorum's just a couple of hundred votes behind on 9.3 per cent.

Ron Paul's second place – with an impressive and expectation-beating 23 per cent – makes him Romney's closest challenger in votes cast and delegates earned so far in the contest. But his support in the upcoming states looks more limited, meaning he won't be the man to stop Mitt Romney. In fact, second place in New Hampshire may well be the high point of Paul's whole 2012 campaign.

Certainly, we can expect last night's results to be the high-water mark of Jon Huntsman’s candidacy. He managed to turn his mini-surge of the past week into a creditable 17 per cent and third place, although he did end up quite a distance behind Paul for second. But when you consider that New Hampshire has been the sole focus of Huntsman's campaign, it's hard to see him repeating even that result elsewhere. Instead, he'll more likely fall back to the bottom of the pack in the next few contests.