Sarah Palin still isn’t endorsing a candidate in the Republican presidential race, but she acknowledges that she believes Newt Gingrich’s drubbing of Mitt Romney in the South Carolina primary on Saturday makes the former House speaker the clear front-runner.
The 2008 Republican vice-presidential candidate, speaking on Fox News Saturday night, said Texas Gov. Rick Perry “took one for the team” when he suspended his campaign and endorsed Gingrich.
“I think what Rick Perry having dropped out and that patriot having done well for the front-runner, whom I will call Newt Gingrich now, being the front-runner, having endorsed him, was a good smart move,” Palin told Fox’s Bret Baier. “He kind of took one for the team there, the conservative team, when he dropped out.”
The former Alaska governor said Gingrich’s victory in the Palmetto State didn’t surprise her in the least.
“I don’t know, do political pundits back there in the Beltway feign surprise, or are you really surprised that Newt Gingrich did as well as he did?” she said.
Prolonging the nomination race is good for the GOP, she said, adding: “The more vetting, the more ideas vigorously debated, the better it is for the electorate. So we need this to continue, and I’m glad to see the result that was tonight, knowing that it will continue and we can start talking about more of the solutions that this country needs to get back on the right track.”
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