WASHINGTON - Mitt Romney scored his third major victory in the Republican presidential race on Saturday as his chief rival for the prize, Newt Gingrich, vowed to stay in the race and run a positive campaign even as he launched another scathing attack against his rival.
Romney won the "first in the West" Nevada caucuses with almost 50 per cent of the vote, while Gingrich and libertarian congressman Ron Paul were in a fierce battle for second place.
"This is not the first time you gave me your vote of confidence and this time I'm going to take it to the White House," Romney, who resoundingly won the state during his first run for president four years ago, told his cheering supporters in Las Vegas.
His victory speech once again took aim at U.S. President Barack Obama. He accused the president of coming to office apologizing for America while "he should be apologizing to America."
Gingrich, meantime, held a Las Vegas news conference to reiterate his vow to remain in the race until the Republican National Convention in Tampa in late August. It was a departure from the more traditional practice of addressing supporters at a campaign rally after caucus results are known.
"I am not going to withdraw, I am actually very happy with where we are," Gingrich said, adding he intended to be competitive "in every single state in the country."
Yet even though his campaign said Gingrich would provide details of a new strategy to win delegates, the former speaker of the House of Representatives provided vague details on how he'd achieve it.
Instead, he reiterated a laundry list of complaints about Romney, calling him "blatantly dishonest" and untrustworthy while, in the same breath, assailing his rival for being overly negative.
Gingrich is still particularly miffed about a pair of debates in Florida, saying Romney was "substantially dishonest" about his record during one of the faceoffs.
"I frankly was stunned ... it was blatant, it was deliberate and he knew he was doing it," Gingrich said.
He predicted he'd be the frontrunner again before long, challenged Romney to more debates and said it was no surprise his foe had won "Mormon Nevada." Romney, indeed, had long been favoured to win Nevada, with its significant Mormon population.
Gingrich has had a rough road on the campaign trail since his resounding loss to Romney in Florida following a US$14 million barrage of negative advertising launched against him by pro-Romney forces.
Gingrich's campaign suggested to reporters all week that real estate mogul Donald Trump was about to endorse him; in fact, the mega-mouthed billionaire threw his support behind the former Massachusetts governor on Thursday.
He also reportedly missed a meeting with Brian Sandoval, governor of Nevada. Sandoval supported Texas Gov. Rick Perry's run for president and was thought to be ready to back Gingrich.
Nonetheless, Gingrich handlers have high hopes for so-called Super Tuesday, a day of multiple caucuses and primaries on March 6. The delegate-rich state of Georgia, in particular, could be fertile ground for Gingrich.
The winning candidate has to win 1,144 delegates to get the nomination. Victories in the early primaries and caucuses generally propel a winning candidate to the later states on a wave of momentum.
Romney's already taken New Hampshire, Florida, and now the Nevada caucuses.
But there are some disturbing signs ahead for the Republicans.
Their intention to hit Obama hard on the economy could be more difficult with promising new jobs numbers that caused the nation's unemployment rate to drop to 8.3 per cent.
And except for South Carolina, voter turnout at the party's primaries and caucuses is down from four years ago, possibly a sign of a lack of enthusiasm for the Republican candidates.
© The Canadian Press, 2012