exit poll. how did they vote? santorum led, gingrich second, romney third among very conservative voters in alabama. >> we'll be going over a lot of the numbers in the next few hours. we're watching very carefully, within only a matter of seconds. the polls in alabama and mississippi will be closed. we're right at the top of the hour. the polls are closed. right now, we cannot, repeat, not make a projection in either mississippi or alabama. based on the exit poll information we're getting, we cannot give you a projection, at least not yet. here's why. let's look at the exit polls. we'll share these numbers with you, polls we took of individuals after they emerged from voting, alabama first. here's what we see in alabama based on exit polls. look at this. rick santorum with 34%, mitt romney, very close, 29%, 28%, newt gingrich, a battle for

second place, at least according to the exit polls, ron paul way, way behind in alabama with only 6%. these are the exit poll numbers in alabama. let's take a look at mississippi right now. here's what our exit polls showed. look at this. 35% for mitt romney. wow. 30% for newt gingrich, 29% for rick santorum, 5%, 5% only for ron paul. newt gingrich, at least according to the exit polls, not ahead in either mississippi or alabama. these are just the exit polls, these are not official numbers. we have no official significant numbers at least yet, john. a win for santorum, at least, according to the exit polls, a win for mitt romney, newt gingrich, not so much. >> if newt gingrich is 0 for two in the south, a lot of questions. why can't we call this campaign? you saw the numbers. that's why. you look deeper at the exit polling, we know 54% of voters

said the economy was issue number one. governor romney has a healthy lead, gingrich second and santorum. in this lead, governor romney has a healthy lead. others said the budget deficit matters. romney lead upset among these voters, senator santorum with a slight lead. governor romney on the big issue and breaks about even on the deficit. and albany, 50% say the economy is issue number one. romney leading, santorum second, gingrich a close battle. on the big issue, governor romney seems to have a healthy lead. however, the budget deficit, in every state, republicans, economy first, budget deficit second. gingrich lead pretty decent lead over governor romney. they're splitting among the issues and governor romney among some and moves over on others. you might be surprised, how is

governor romney competitive in both these deep southern states. maybe you think they're way more conservative than your state. look at this ideological breakdown. largely a white electorate but diverse. 42% in mississippi very conservative, 27% somewhat conservative. 30% describe themselves as moderate to liberal in this deep south. and almost identical numbers in albany, 38% very, 31% somewhat conservative and 31% moderate or liberal. perhaps it's not as deeply conservative as one might expect. you know the questions, can he win. this is a big test, the highest number of all the contests we've had so far, mississippi has the highest percentage of people who identify themselves as evangelical born again christians, 81% in the state of mississippi. that's a critical test for governor romney. >> let me press you on mississippi, according to the

ex exit poll numbers, mitt romney is ahead. if there's 81% who describe themselves as white evangelical born again, that's a significant development if, a huge if, if he goes on to win in mississippi. >> that means he would have done well if not win the evangelical vote and has to win all these votes. that would be a huge defining moment. let's slide over. you look at the map and contest and how this fills in. romney has won pretty much all over the country. senator santorum mostly in the midwest. you can play a strange game of dominos, all his states are connected. the question, can santorum get one of these. gingrich wants to dominate the south. the exit polls shows a possibility gingrich doesn't win tonight and we start looking. remember the state of ohio. i will show you what happened recently in ohio. this is governor romney's key. if he will win one of these states, the map would look something like this, you see a dot, major population center,

where he has done very well. santorum and gingrich wins in rural areas. you come down to these states tonight, you look at mississippi, he needs to do well along the coast and suburbs of jackson, middle part of the state and this is where you have tea party and evangelical voters, don't look for governor romney to do well in the middle of the state. it's very similar if you move to the gulf coast area important for governor romney and major suburbs in birmingham and montgomery. >> we will be getting a much better appreciation over those counties in alabama and mississippi. >> if newt gingrich were to come in second or third in these two states, that would be a significant setback for his hopes. >> it certainly would. he's been counting on at least one of these states the last couple of weeks, ari fleischer, if he does not come in first, can he justify continuing? >> to use a french expression in mississippi and alabama, newt has to have the south. if he doesn't have it, i just

cannot see a rational for him to go on. newt, at the end of the day, newt is a big eye with big ideas and also will put the party first. let's see what happens. real close in both state. >> does it surprise you, mary in the exit polls he does not seem to be in the lead? >> no, because in mississippi, it's low turnout, hands down, romney had a good organization. a good organization, low turnout goes a long way. romney continues to have electability. romney's been closing well and he closes on the electability question. that doesn't mean gingrich has to get out or they don't like gingrich or he's not a southerner, whatever. he just never has tapped into that electability thing which continues to be the number one concern for republicans. >> he can live off the land, as we've been saying for quite a while, even if he doesn't win anything. >> he can but he needs debates. that's where he has sho

shown -- he's had a few bad debates, mostly he's been terrific in debates and kept him going living off the land. he does have in mr. and police adelson powerful done nors from a super pac. he can live off the land or as i said earlier, off ego and just keep this going. he may lose his rational. that doesn't mean he will be rational and make a rational decision. >> increasingly, he will look like the spoiler here and there will be pressure on him. one of the interesting things in the exit polls is gingrich and santorum supporters both said they would be satisfied if the other candidate were the nominee. those same voters were less satisfied if romney were the nominee. their voters seem much more interchangeable even by the exit polls than the romney voter. that's why that clean shot at mitt romney is so important for conservatives. >> to our analysts, if mitt romney did win in mississippi, for instance, that would be a

major feather in his cap to say i won in a southern state. >> right. he's had a huge psychological hole in the middle of his campaign, which is he can't win in the deep south where the base of the republican party resides, the most fervent and conservative. if you're campaigning as a conservative, you ought to be able to win there. when you talk to romney advisors, they will tell you, if they can win mississippi or alabama, it's something they would not have anticipated. they have organized, they have a huge get out the effort there. you were talking about low turnout really really matters. this gives them just one more thing to say, you know what, if these other fellows are conservative, why did we win in the most conservative state? sn>> if romney can win mississii tonight, he will have jumped over one of the last remaining hurdles on the way to the nomination. he had to show he had strength in the south in a state where 80% of the people voting are evangelicals.

if he can win in that state, that really burnishes his credentials. the other part of this story, if gingrich were to lose both, exit polls were to hold, he would be in a situation a lot of people in the conservative community would be saying, but, newt, you ought to put your loyalty to conservati conservativism above your ego. you ought to give us a clean shot at romney with only one candidate. >> joe johns is standing by with the chief of staff for newt gingrich. let's check in with him. joe. >> reporter: that's right, anderson. this is patrick membership s membership -- patrick millsaps. he is the chief of staff for newt gingrich. the early exit polls show newt gingrich is not in the lead, rather, either second or third. so the question for you tonight is what's the implication for newt gingrich if he doesn't win one or both of these states this evening? >> i think first we have to wait, i think it will be a long night. the polls up until now have shown this is a tight race, a

three-way race. we're not even at the halfway mark of this campaign season. louisiana will be the halfway point. depending on what happens tonight, i think that we'll do well in the south, we'll pick up delegates, no matter where we are. it's interesting, a few minutes ago, before i walked down here, secretary of energy chu has now altered his position on higher gas prices. so now we have a white house that's responding to, one, presidential candidate, that's newt gingrich. >> it's pretty clear that your campaign thinks you're doing pretty well with the gas price issue. i think the question for this campaign is, is there a water mark? is there a place he has to come in, in order for you to feel that you're credible going forward? >> i think we're credible candidate now and again, only time tonight will tell in terms of where we end up. if we have a first, second place finish, we'll all get delegates

and we'll do the math and go to illinois and louisiana and louisiana will be the halftime. >> reporter: coming into mississippi and alabama, there was some talk, even from inside the campaign that you had to win here or else you wouldn't be credible going forward. have you shifted that view? >> that didn't come from newt gingrich. that was, i think that was reported, but in terms of when we did the math and looked at the delegate count and where we are right now, mitt romney has spent 10-1 money against both santorum and gingrich and can't close the deal. he's not hit the halfway mark for delegates. there will be a long path to tampa. i think that you're going to see us there. >> reporter: very quickly, you guys put out a memo today in the second half of the campaign, you think you will do better than the first. >> we have wisconsin, police gingrich' home state and maryland and d.c. and louisiana is part of the south.

>> reporter: patrick millsaps, thanks so much. good talking to you. comeback any time. >> we're also watching very closely what the gingrich campaign is doing is the santorum. the spokesperson for santorum. jim. >> reporter: that's right. i'm joined now with alice stewart, the press secretary for the santorum campaign. we saw those exit polls showing rick santorum winning in mississippi, a close thi third -- excuse me, winning in alabama, close third in alabama. it seems to me the spin from the romney camp if they can pull one out in this south, we can win in the south. seems to me you might say, newt gingrich, it's time to go. >> absolutely. being son of the south, you should be doing much better than this. the numbers indicate rick santorum is the consistent conservative. he resonates with the people and we will do well going down the primary calendar. for him to do as well as he's doing in the south goes to show he has the momentum and right

message. mitt romney is out of touch with the money he has and as long as he's been doing this, he should be running away with this, the fact he's not in touch with what voters want, not in touch with them in terms of economic issues, social issues and, you know, a lot of the comments he makes in terms of my wife's got a couple of cars and i like to fire people, those things are turning off voters. >> let me ask you about what rick santorum had to say earlier today, he was on the glen beck program and he essentially called for newt gingrich to jump out of the race. earlier this week, he said, i don't want to tell newt gingrich to get out of the race. he was definitely taking a more aggressive posture. why is that? >> i think all of them should get out of the race. >> reporter: i don't think that will happen. >> he is the conservative candidate that can take barack obama. >> we have gingrich and a lot of issues are off this table, the

grandfather of obama-care, that issue is off the table. cap and trade, that issue is off the table. bailouts, that's off the table. rick santorum is the candidate in this race that is the contrast to barack obama. that's what people are beginning to recognize. people are frustrated with romney given he wrote the model for obama-care and was dishonest with the american people saying all along it was just for massachusetts but now we've come to learn he did advocate for being implemented nationwide. >> earlier today, mitt romney was on the "situation room" and told wolf blitzer, rick santorum is at the disappoint end of his campaign. what do you have to say about that? >> that's not very nice. we're in good shape. the romney campaign has been pushing. >> is that not very southern of him? >> no southern hospitality with that statement. look, they've been pushing around this fuzzy math, nonsense about it's mathematically impossible for rick to win this. that is a smoke screen to distract from the fact he's not resonating the base. we have good support from many states up next on the primary

calendar. a lot of delegates are unbound. those delegates will be garnered around a more conservative candidate and a conservative base, tea party base, they don't want a massachusetts moderate. they will rally behind rick santorum. this will be, after tonight, it will be a two man race, rick and mitt and we will clear the field and rick has a good shot down the road. >> alice stewart, thanks. you heard it there. after tonight, they think it will be a two-person race, rick santorum and mitt romney. >> we're getting an update on the exit poll numbers we shared with you a few minutes ago. we're still going through or crunching these numbers. i think there will be some changes in the top line exit poll numbers. stand by. we'll let you know what's going on right now. also something fascinating is going on in alabama right now. prisoners with striped jumpsuits, they're getting ready to be involved in this election in alabama tonight. we'll explain what's going on. our own dana bash is on the

scene. much more coming up. we're here at the cnn "election center." this night is only just beginning, get ready for results, real results coming in from alabama and mississippi. [ male announcer ] if you believe the mayan calendar, on december 21st, polar shifts will reverse the earth's gravitational pull

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[ male announcer ] take action. take advil®. and if pain keeps you up, sleep better with advil pm. we have important information just coming in. a revised updated exit poll information. there's been a change. more information coming in on the mississippi exit poll. take a look at this. it's narrowed a bit. 33% for mitt romney, 31% right there for rick santorum. 30% for newt gingrich, only 5% for ron paul. look at that battle that's going on. it's literally a three-man race. right now, romney is first, santorum is second, gingrich is third, ron paul obviously fourth. these are only exit poll numbers. we're waiting for more information. this is the latest round coming in. we've tabulated all the numbers,

not just the first round. stand by. more information will be coming in. you saw earlier, the exit poll numbers for alabama. right now, santorum in the exit poll had 34%, romney second with 29%, 28% for gingrich. that's third reich there. once again a third place if these numbers were to hold, that's a huge if right now. these are only exit polls, what individuals told us after they emerged from the voting booths. ron paul only 6%. a very close race in short in both of these states. alabama an mississippi. we're waiting for the official numbers to start coming in. we have something right now. we will show you that you will only see here on cnn. dana bash is standing by in birmingham, alabama. shanna travis is in pass sca goo la, mississippi. to you, look what we see behind you. we see police officers and also see men in striped jumpsuits, if you will.

what's going on? >> reporter: what's going on, we are at the loading dock, waiting for the ballots to all come in from all around this very important jefferson county. what's going to happen is these cars are going to come out, people are going to help bring the ballots in. two of the people who are here are inmates. they're here from the county jail, which happens to be right on top of where we are, wolf. this is a government facility and the jail is attached. these two gentlemen, we're told, were sentenced to hard labor, normally that includes working in the kitchen, cleaning floors, et cetera, on election days, this is something we've been doing for years i'm told, they get outside and get fresh air and help the election officials bring the ballots in. what they will do is bring the actual ballots in this room. it's the vault and it's empty right now because the ballots have not started to arrive and they will come in 10 minutes or so. once the actual hardball lots go

in there, these days, things are computerized and are electronic. they will bring memory cards into this particular area here and will bring it to this window. this gentleman here will take the memory cards. he has a computer back here. i'm not sure if you can see it from this vantage point. he will put the memory card into the computer and that will start tabulate the results in this important county of jefferson county. this is the most populous county in the state, why we're here, why a lot of eyes are on this county, jefferson county, because this well could determine who will win the state and the republican primary. the romney campaign specifically is going to be watching this big-time. i'm told by folks in their campaign, they're really looking at the out skirts which tend to be more affluent and will get the numbers up there. i want to show you one last thing, what we've seen in other states, a fishbowl, a pod, these folks will be getting -- you saw the first computer and will be

getting the results from there and tabulating it and putting it out to the public and us and give us a sense realtime who is winning and who is doing well. all of the raw numbers that we're going to get as we see them. >> so, dana, if this works the way we anticipate, if it's very close in alabama, you, just as you did in some of the other contests, you will get the first indications and we will be way ahead of the other news organizations in sharing this with our viewers, is that right? >> reporter: we hope so. i will swing around and show you what we're looking at here. this is a board, a little bit off center here. you can see that we will have all the candidates, some of them obviously not in the race now but still on the ballot. the candidates, we will be seeing the results realtime. we have also the probate judge, alan king, who is in charge of this. he is here with us and will be joining us later to help us give the results and be giving them to you. >> we'll be sharing with you

what you know with our viewers in the united states and around the world. thanks. shannon travis is in pass spass, mississippi. tell us what access you have? >> we're at the election commission office. a similar process to what dana just explained. ballot counting and all that. let me walk you through that. this is the door where the 31 precincts in jackson county will be delivering their materials. they will stop at one of two tables. either the balloting for republicans or balloting for democrats. democrats also held their primary today in mississippi. then, one of the most important pieces of this night, what i have in my hand right here, is the a dummy. this is the memory card each one of the voting machines here in jackson county, this is what

records those actual ballots. these ballots will come out of those bags over there among the different materials and come to a sort of nerve center where danny glascotts, the chairman of the election commission, take each one of these cards and insert it into this machine and this machine will start to not only tabulate a ticker tape of what the results are but he will be uploading them into this computer. wolf, as you just talked to dana about, we will be getting those unofficial tallies first and showing you those once they come in. let me swing around and show you a few more steps in this process here. these are the tables where the ballots will be dropped out. this is where some of the absentee ballots will be dropped off, where they need to be resolved and those will be added to the tally. i'm being told we have ballots that might be coming in right now. let's take a look and see what we have going on. i will just open the door and

see. in fact, if you can see right here, we've got some poll aides who are helping secure - secure -- helping basically with the bags where a lot of the materials i just explained to you are going to be coming one by one from the different precincts. we'll continue to monitor them. actually, i might as well holed the door for them while they come in. you notice the blue bags, they contain a lot of different materials. what's most key to us, wolf, is this card i showed you before, that has all the balloting information, votes for mitt romney, ron paul, newt gingrich, rick santorum, we will be showing you some raw data. one other thing about this county, one of the most republican in mississippi, wolf, mississippi, mccain won the state by 13 points in 2008. in jackson county, he beat barack obama by 33 points, wolf.

>> if you have a second, go inside and ask that woman to explain what's in those bags, if you don't mind and see if she will explain it to our viewers. >> reporter: absolutely. let's go inside. we will talk to danny. danny is in charge. danny, you're live on cnn with wolf blitzer and he has a question to explain what's inside that bag. >> there's actually two bags. one is called a handball lot bag. in that bag, we're asking for specific items. what we're looking for first is the memory cards. tonight, the memory cards are assigned to the democrats because we switch them back and forth. one party does it one time and one does it the next time. we're looking for the handball let bags. to the memory pack with ballot card and absentee list. >> reporter: you gave me a sample like this. >> the voter list and absentee book we will process tonight. >> reporter: how fast do you think you will be processing these cards. you told me you have 235 out. >> we have 235 machines out.

as soon as they come in, i start uploading the results here. as soon as the machine counts the ballots on the machine, it uploads them to the system and records them. >> reporter: we'll be looking over your shoulder and looking forward to those results. >> i'll be here. >> thank you, danny. we appreciate it very much. we will watch everything unfolding. when we come back, the first official numbers are coming in. we will check in alabama and mississippi and see what's going on. we'll continue our coverage right after this. [ male announcer ] the cadillac cts sport sedan was designed with near-perfect weight balance from front to back... and back to front. ♪ giving you exceptional control from left to right...

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we got our ballot cameras watching everything going on in birmingham, alabama, pascagoula, mississippi. we'll check back with our corresponde correspondents dana bash and others. i want to go to john king. we have been studying closely or

you have, all these exit polls. you're getting new information what the voters actually thought about mitt romney in both of these southern states. >> because these races are so close, we're trying to dig and dig to find hints and clues. one thing regardless who you voted for, who do you think is most likely to defeat president obama? who's the strongest republican candidate in the general election. in mississippi, half, fully half said governor romney. if you look at this, no surprise. he gets 63% of the votes among those who say they think he's the strongest general election candidate. that's great and you have a lot of other people who even though they said romney was the strongest candidate, 37% said, no, we'll vote for somebody else. >> electability is important but not necessarily decisive. >> not in an ideological prim y primary. that's the tension we see in states voting. vote with their heart or mind for the fall. alabama, almost half, a little

fewer here. 46% say governor romney is the best general election candidate and among these voters he gets two-thirds of the voters and the others splitting the vote and the rest committed. and this is fascinating to me. governor romney's positions on the issues, too conservative, not conservative enough or about right? about half of the voters in alabama say governor romney is not conservative enough. you would think he wouldn't do very well. you pull up among these voters you see that. 44% for santorum, 27% for gingrich and 8% for romney. that's the state of alabama. move over, mississippi right next door. half of the voters say governor romney is not conservative enough, break down those, santorum, gingrich and romney. governor romney among those who say he's not conservative enough is struggling, one of the things that might work to his advantage getting deep tore counting the votes, in the areas where governor romney is struggling, no one candidate, you have a split between gingrich and

santorum, that is helping governor romney and you go through issue after issue. three in 10 describe themselves as moderate or liberal and 27% somewhat conservative. among very liberal voters in mississippi, romney struggles a little bit. competitive but third behind the two candidates. if you come to somewhat conservative voters, you see a romney string, heating 38%. one reason we can't call these races and seeing different leaders in different subsets and a fascinating tug-of-war. >> a very tight three-man race, i think it's fair to say, in both of those states. we're watching very closely and about to get official numbers coming in as well. if romney were to win at least one of these states, it would be a huge, huge gain to him looking down the road to illinois next week and the states that follow. >> no doubt. it would allow him to say he won

in the deep south when newt gingrich won in georgia. >> it is interesting when you see the breakdown in voters, 33% in mississippi describe themselves as moderate to liberal in the republican open party. >> it's an open primary, too. you could have more moderate voters don't have a democrat to vote for decided they wanted to participate in this. the key to me though was what john was just saying, sort of interesting that the republican party, with its head, says, okay, we think mitt romney can beat barack obama, that's why we want to go for him. with their hearts -- >> don't think he's conservative enough. >> don't think he's conservative enough. one interesting exit poll about what the candidates understand the average problems of americans. in both of these states, newt gingrich wins and mitt romney comes in way behind. it's sort of interesting. >> mitt romney has been somewhat tone deaf on the campaign trail.

recently talking about eating grits, like he just discovered grits. >> he's been willing to poke fun at himself recently, i think the first sign of growth. moderate in mississippi has a very different meaning than being a moderate in manhattan. it's a different universe what you're talking about. i don't read that much into it. >> cooper family reunion is in mississippi every summer. watch what you're saying there. >> are you visiting? >> i do. my dad was born in mississippi. we don't talk much about politics. >> that says something to me about your gen tilt. all of us are struck by now this closing up in mississippi, santorum has drawn within striking distance in recent exit polls. if santorum were to win tonight, that would put a different cast on the evening. >> the very criticism of voters he's not conservative enough, that would play well in a general election among

independents. >> it would. we have to remember, we are talking about the primaries. the chances these evangelical very conservative republicans are going to vote for barack obama instead of mitt romney were he to become the nominee are zero. so we're not talking about the fall here, we're just talking about right now. we did the same thing in ohio, we were talking earlier, talking about mitt romney winning the ci cities. the chances of mitt romney winning the cities in ohio are close to zero. >> in the suburbs. >> we need to at least say what we're talking about here, not that mitt romney will lose these votes, it is simply he can't get them right now in the primary process. i wanted to comment on something hillary said earlier, just because i remember very well in ju june, when hillary clinton pulled out of the race after the final contest. in that room in washington were all these people who had supported her said i will never vote. >> i remember that. >> i will never vote for barack

obama. i will not vote for barack obama. >> they were screaming that as i remember. >> guess what. almost all of them came home. we can build this up into something that will dissipate by september. >> the measure of their enthusiasm by the way may be with the fact they're willing to go with electability for somebody they don't really like. i've had this debate with ari fleischer for weeks. if you look at these southern primaries, what you're seeing are voters who really want to win. so they may be going for a candidate that they don't love but they think he can beat barack obama which may give us some indication about voter enthusiasm among republicans. >> i want to go to jessica yellin in washington. is that the concern of the obama white house, that romney can appeal to independents because of those people who say he's not conservative enough? >> reporter: they know that this is going to be a razor thin margin of victory no matter who the candidate is. they expect it to be mitt

romney. they are planning for an appeal to the independents right now, anderson. right now, while this is going on, they are out with a campaign, tomorrow, they will unveil nurses for obama. they're focused on pushing what they already unveiled in their health care platform that will appeal to independents. you've seen what they've done to try to appeal to women. so, yes, they're targeting, while all this is going on in these primaries and we're focused on these conservative voters, they're focused on this independent voters in these swing states and they're sending vice president biden to ohio in two days to give a mess sarge designed to appeal to swing voters lunch bucket voters if you want to call it and will take it to republicans maybe by name and send a hard hitting message that you will hear for the first time from the vice president and increasingly from the white house to appeal to exactly the voters you're talking about. >> jessica, we have seen a big drop just in the most recent cbs

news poll of favorable ratings for president obama. a month ago, he had reached 50% for the first time in a while. it's now down to 41% among those who say they approve of the job he's doing. >> reporter: i'll tell you what they say on background, which is basically, nothing. >> they actually say pasha? >> reporter: i'm paraphrasing. the actual -- so if you -- at the same time, anderson today, there's a reuters poll that shows the president's approval rating at 50%. the overarching point in politics, it is a lifetime between now and the election. i would point out this same "new york times" poll showed the president at 58% -- 57% approval in may of 2011 and four months later he had plummeted to 43% and now even lower at 41%.

these numbers go all over the place. if you take a snapshot in time, it's meaningless. so, yes, gas prices are rising. iran has been, you know, tension filled. there's all sorts of reasons you could look at these numbers and have concerns. they are concerns. >> david gergen is shaking his head. there actually has been good news you would think would be good for the president, in terms of job numbers, for instance, and yet in the same time frame, these numbers have dropped significantly. >> i think that's right. i think it's a surprise. we had two polls out this week a wake-up call for the white house and frankly for the press. there had been a growing conventional wisdom as the president had become the front-runner against mitt romney or any other republican and very very likely to win the election, i think these polls show what the white house has been saying all along, this could be a very very close race is apt to be quite true, that there is a base of people out there who want somebody different. whether it's gas prices or iran

or whether it could be five other issues that come up between now and then, that the president does not have this in the bag and it's very worth having a republican nomination. >> the problem with the gas price issue is that it affects everyone whether you, you know, are a business, or whether you're just trying to get to work. in that it undermines consumer confidence about the future. every time consumer confidence is undermined, that hurts the president. >> we haven't had debates -- we haven't had republican debates lately, so suddenly, it seems to be, barack obama is going down in the polls, republicans were heading down in the polls, mitt romney was losing ground with independent voters in the middle of all those debates. now that we haven't had any, suddenly, this seems to be eveni evening out, i'm wondering whether it's barack obama against x and not looking at those four people that may affect this. >> i think there is still a fundamental reality. these primaries have left romney in a worse position than he

would have been had they gone a very different way. >> i want to check in with wolf blitzer. we have motion going on in alabama. >> dana bash is standing by. what's happening? we some of the prisoners getting ready to work. tell our viewers what we're looking at. >> reporter: we're looking at the first ballots arriving here at the center, where we are reporting from, where they're going to count all the ballots from jefferson county. this is probably going to be ultimately a steady stream of ballots coming in. this is the first bag that has come in. you see the inmates, as we described earlier, they're inmates from a jail literally right above where we are. they're just in for misdemean misdemeanors, only in for a year, but part of their sentence is to do hard labor. come election time, we're told for years they've been doing this as part of their sentence. but, again, we're waiting to see these ballots come in and along with the actual paper ballots, we're also going to have the

memory cards, which, of course, are going to be put right into a computer so we can get the results from this county as soon as we can. this is just the first bash of ballots that we've seen, we're seeing tonight. >> stand by. i want to go to shannon travis, over in pascagoula, mississippi. you have initial votes already, shannon? >> reporter: that's right. these are the first unofficial raw numbers in pascagoula, as you just mentioned, wolf, i have raw numbers, out of 401 votes cast in one precincts alone, mitt romney, 135 votes, newt gingrich, 127 votes, ron paul, 19 votes, and rick santorum, 115 votes. as i mentioned before, i'm here with danny, basically in charge of this election commission. he will briefly explain to us how he just delivered those numbers to us. you have those cards there, danny. >> yeah. >> they're coming in from the

different precincts. what's the next step? >> we insert them in the machines and upload the results. when weapon upload the results, it prints off the totals. >> reporter: it's pretty blazing fast. >> pretty fast. prints off totals. there was 52 votes on one card. when i get through, it tells me the results were successfully uploaded. i pop the card out and put in another card. >> reporter: you just processed 16 of those cards, all 16 for one precinct. >> correct. >> reporter: that's how we got the numbers you uploaded automatically from that machine into here? >> correct. >> when it does, it will tell me it's uploading and how many votes are on the bottom of the machine. when it finishes will show me a count for that particular machine. >> reporter: again, wolf, these are numbers just coming in. no one else has seen these numbers except us because we're right here. democracy in action. i'll repeat those numbers to you. >> will you repeat the numbers, shannon? give us the top three right now. ron paul is way behind. i want our viewers to appreciate how close in that one precinct

it is between these three top candidates. >> reporter: that's right. that's right. you're absolutely right. mitt romney, 135 out of these votes, he has the most. newt gingrich comes in second at 127, wolf, and in third, is rick santorum, at 115. that's out of 401 votes cast in that one precinct. >> it's very very tight. i don't know if that one precinct is representative of the whole state. it probably is, based on the exit poll numbers we're getting. it will be very close in mississippi as well as alabama. we're watching all of this unfold. some of the official numbers, more coming in as well. stand by, our election numbers continues from the cnn "election center" in a moment. we're america's natural gas

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all right. we have some official numbers

coming in very very early. less than 1% of the vote in. i still want to share them with you. shows you it's going to be tight based on the exit poll numbers. in mississippi, right now, 34% for rick santorum, 34% for newt gingrich, 27% for mitt romney. 4% for ron paul. look at the few people that have been officially counted. so far, 382 for santorum, 3281 f3281 -- 3381 for gingrich. 302 for romney. in alabama, 122 for santorum, 100 for romney an 94 for gingrich. 34, 28, 56%. shaping up very very close, three-man contest. we know what the exit polls have shown us. what will be really important when all is said and done. >> yes. coffee. >> it could be a long night.

also delegates. it's not winner take all as used to be the case in republican primaries, it's proportional. >> and why the number one statewide, closeness would matter and go by congressional district. first, looking at the overall map and bragging rights. let's not forget hawaii and samoa. speaker gingrich, two, bragging rights in the south. as all the candidates say, you hear governor romney talking about this, it's about delegates. no matter what happens, it's about delegates, even if he runs second or third, he gets delegates. is the what you need to win. as you can see, nobody's close. governor romney is in the ballpark. you see senator santorum not even half. you add up all the candidates, you don't get to governor romney. well ahead does not mean

anywhere near clinching. let's turn this off and look at what might happen. we go through this, tap on this for today, we assume governor romney will win hawaii, i gave him proportional delegates for hawaii and assume he will win a samoa, based on our reporting. i will do this hypothetically and for the sake of argument, governor romney wins the state of mississippi, let's do alabama, say senator santorum does, you see what happened, romney goes up a little bit, santorum goes up a little bit and even gingrich, it's proportional. i will switch this, say santorum wins both, in terms of delegates, romney only went down a half-dozen. it would not have a huge impact on delegate chase. he would still gain delegates and go forward. what it would have an impact on is bragging rights and the big question, is he weak? senator santorum said i've won

in the west and colorado and geographical base of the party. i'm the better candidate nationally. if you have this and have a romney win, he will say i'm almost up to the halfway mark. i won a big swing state in florida, proved myself in the south, won in new england, won in the midwest, i'm the stronger national candidate. delegate factor might not mean a lot if romney is a second opposed to winning but it's about bragging rights. >> let's say gingrich, hypothetical were to drop out. he's got 131 delegates right now, what happens to the delegates in the convention in tampa. >> they are technically free agents. some are reassigned. and by projections. most of his delegates come from south carolina and georgia and a few other states where he ran close seconds and third. they become available. the other candidates can lobby them. gingrich can say i want to hold

them until i get to tampa. most you premium, they were his delegates stay with him. rules vary state by state. there are perry and huntsman delegates and other people candidates left the race and other candidates go and can try to compete for. can they sign up for other candidates. it's a projection, some delegates are bound and others not bound and some still early in the process and we make projections based on the voting results and follow up constant reporting trust me our delegate team works long hours to keep this going. there is a possibility a delegate drops, become a free agent, why they say don't suspend, keep going and part of the reason is to hold onto the delegates. go to dana bash. you see birmingham. >> jefferson county is important. >> you're getting new votes coming into birmingham. what are you seeing?

>> reporter: that's right. you saw the ballots actually coming off the cars and now being inputted. we have, i should tell you, judge allen king, in charge here and he will walk us through. i'll start you off here. wolf, these numbers are changing by the second because they're being inputted. right now, you can see rick santorum ahead slightly. tell us the rest. >> what we have, this number, we have 360 voting machines in jefferson county, 177 precincts, 14 voting machines already been inputted. from that, you have the different vote totals. this will be a continuous feed and update throughout the evening. >> reporter: right now the vote tot talls just changed. rick santorum 257 votes in the lead. newt gingrich behind with 239 votes and mitt romney, 232. with very little reporting, only 14 out 360, you just said, wow, it's a three-way race. but it's very early. >> dana, thanks very much.

i will take a quick break. we will continue our coverage in a moment. what if it's a three-man race, very very tight in both of these states. we're watching it very closely. we'll see who actually wins up winning. by a few,000 votes or few hundred votes or what happens. stand by our coverage. we'll continue in a moment. ♪ [ male announcer ] for our families... our neighbors... and our communities... america's beverage companies have created a wide range of new choices.

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it's all about absorption. welcome back to the cnn election center. it's a very very tight race both in mississippi and alabama. a three-man race in both states. you saw what the exit polls showed. we're beginning to get real numbers. 6% of the precinct is now in. mitt romney 36%.

and newt gingrich, 28%. and rick santorum, 6%. only 17 votes with 6% of the vote in mississippi only 17 votes separate mitt romney and rick santorum. watch that. that's pretty amazing what's going on. 6%, still very early, but we're watching it. the exit polls showed a very very tight race in mississippi as well. in alabama, fewer votes have come in, only 1% not even but tight. 34% for romney, 30% for santorum, 26% for newt gingrich. 6% ron paul. this is really early we're watching. we have our ballot cameras and reporters watching. we will be bringing you the numbers first before anyone else. we have cameras in birmingham, alabama. those are inmates walking to the car. they've been asked -- they've been told actually -- they're going to carry the boxes of the votes into the election

headquarters, jefferson county jail in birmingham, alabama. this is their job for the night. they're serving time in the prison there, one of their responsibilities is to help out and do manual labor. that's exactly what they're doing. pascagoula, mississippi, we have cameras as well. look at this, mississippi, 6% in, now only six votes separating santorum and romney. santorum slightly ahead by 6 votes. 32% to 32% for romney. so tight with 6% of the vote in, newt gingrich a little further behind but not that far behind, only 29%. look at that. in alabama, they just changed, very early in alabama, much earlier than mississippi. santorum slightly ahead of romney, 21 votes ahead of romney, newt gingrich in third. it's close as well. anything can still happen in alabama. anything can still happen in mississippi. anderson cooper is watching all this happen. anderson, i've been covering

politics a long time. first time i've seen prisoners get involved in this process carrying ballots, inmates car carrying ballots from the cars to the offices. >> pretty fascinating. we're here with our analysts. what do you make of these numbers being so close. a small percentage. a three-way tie basically in both states. >> we are just looking at this. it feels like tonight is the closest of all of these primaries in terms of the spread among these three candidates we've had in the last several weeks, it is that evenly distributed. that, to me, says one thing. it says weak front-runner, i know david gergen will say a win is a win. obviously, it's amusing that, you know, romney and, you know, this coalescing around romney because of the numbers and this is a delegate march, not a state march, but you just captain help to notice every single time

about that lack of enthusiasm. >> tonight has that old-fashioned feel, we're all glued to it. you don't know what's going to happen. if you're political, it doesn't get more exciting. the other thing that makes tonight different as the republican race is turning the corner, races now are a consequence for knockouts. previously, a consequence for positioning, who was the front-runner and compete and go one-on-one against the front-runner. could there be room for three. now, if you lose too many, you get knocked out. that's the future trend of this race. it could happen tonight to newt. that's where this race is going. >> if newt gingrich and santorum are close in the actual vote count, can't both make the argument to stay in? >> i don't think so. you have to win. you're at the point in the race you have to win. previously, you could stay close and keep going. it's turning into a consequence it's a knockout. >> it used to be republicans primary were winner take all. sensibly,thy organized it to mimic the electoral college.

oddly, we copied the democrats and we had a long consequence with barack because of proportional even though the math didn't work for hillary to drop out because she could still win delegates. newt can win delegates in mississippi. an for congressional delegates, sometimes you don't take anything. >> we've been talking about not conservative enough. that's an opinion. conservative enough, good enough is an action. there are none of these voters that are going to say not conservative enough and stay home. that did happen in '08. that's not going to happen this time. while you mention thresholds, i guess you should put on the table, if these numbers hold, there's a 15 and 20% threshold for getting any delegates and paul will not take anything out of here. >> you don't think these candidates are being hurt the longer this race goes on?

you don't think mitt romney is getting hurt? you think he's getting better. >> i absolutely do not. there has never been in the history of modern politics numbers in the spring predictive for the fall. nobody's touching obama. he's out there in the field by himself and has continuing bad job numbers or episodic good job numbers. no, i do not think it's lingering. noel fundamentals have changed out there. i do think it's very helpful and this is why the rnc did it in the first place, there was a y u unanimous vote to change the process so more people could play and feel like they had given their opinion. if they feel like they've given their opinion, he's not conservative enough they will feel better about voting for somebody that they did not think was conservative enough. >> i don't buy it's a conservative versus not conservative issue anymore. mitt romney today announced he wants to get rid of planned parenthood. that's conservative enough.

what the issue is likable enough, popular enough, enthusiastic about your nominee. that's really the piece mitt romney is still focused on. again, this is a march towards delegates, and the, you know, that's why if you're newt, you're going to stay in, you've still got some leverage. if you have a few hundred delegates, maybe you have leverage. if you're rick santorum, you're collecting delegates, that's where you're looking for is where you can keep going. >> the what's extraordinary is it's an hour since these polls closed. we have just a tiny number of votes. what in the devil is going on? i understand the counting process among other things going on here but -- >> they've got nothing but time. >> but a win is a win and a romney win in the deep south is a big win. if he were to pull it out, it would be very significant for him to do that. we'll have to wait and see on that. what is also very apparent, if rick santorum were to win a couple things tonight, given how

close this is, santorum has a much stronger argument if this were a two man race, the dynamics would change. >> if romney wins one or both of these states, when does the so-called establishment start coming in and sort of quietly saying to people, you know what, we really now have to rally around mitt romney because he's going to be our nominee and this process, although mary says it's helpful, maybe you can answer the question, mary. >> there is no establishment really anymore. who's going to tell him to get out? >> they have tried to rally. there is something organic. we can't quantify it. there is something organic. romney has no mow, mini mow, no momentum. there is a bandwagon. at some point, i feel like this is tonight, i'm giving you the feel. not all supporters are created equal. those who get in at a critical juncture or get in early are worth more than supporters who

get in when you don't need them and late. i think that's the narrative, not the establishment rallying, like, i want to get on this bandwagon, a put put momentum but there is a bandwagon. >> electability. people want to be with somebody who they think can beat barack obama than somebody they agree with or love or think understands their problem. in the reality of being a candidate, you also say i'm going all the way to tampa, to the convention, of course you say that, you have to keep your people fired up after the votes come in. i do think there's sobriety among these candidates. and say iing newt has an ego an want to get out. i do think they want to beat obama. if they see there's no path for them and it will take time, tai are people and have to absorb this and over the next couple of days, if it's newt, they will drop out. i don't see him taking down the party, that's not newt gingrich. if he has a chance he will stay

in. >> you think a third place finish for him -- >> he has to win. if he loses both mississippi and alabama the two southern states, he has shown he has the ability to win no where other than south carolina after two debates. >> if newt gets out, sorry, folks, if newt gets out, rick santorum has a clean shot at mitt romney. you look at those numbers, all of a sudden, you can see rick santorum being very competitive with mitt romney with a significant number of gingrich voters. >> it's the last thing mitt romney wants. >> it should be. >> louisiana not being one of them, the rest of the terrain moves toward illinois, which should be better for mitt romney, maryland, wisconsin, the district of columbia. i think mitt romney's in a lot of trouble if santorum gets him one-on-one. true, he would plainly be losing today in both states if he were one-on-one with either of the more conservative candidates. ary knows t ary -- ari knows the speaker far

better than i do, i would be surprised if he gets out. >> over the past couple of weeks, they believe as ari stated, you know, newt gingrich is really mad at you guys, why do you think he will get out. because one of the top guys in the romney campaign said because he's a party guy and he would eventually do that if the writing is on the wall. thy think there will come a time, they think the numbers add up for them already. they think there will come a time you will hear more things like former governor new york pataki said, you know, we're kind of hurting ourselves here and time for -- maybe not direct, hey, newt, get out or santorum time to get out, people worrying aloud what it's doing. they sort of expect that and they expect there might be some defections. >> don't you think it's so personal right now for newt gingrich? >> it could happen tomorrow or next week why did romney run those terrible ads about me saying i resigned in disgrace. >> absolutely.

tomorrow or next week but in the long run, he's a party guy. >> personal doesn't last forever. these people have been around the block long enough and know how to make good judgments when they need to. >> i want to go back to mary d madeleine's point. you can't measure how much damage has been done to romney head on head. on this issue of women and contraception and planned parenthood, mitt romney has been sucked to the right on social issues by santorum. it doesn't show up in the polls so much, i can tell you and you must have run into this all the time, gloria, i run into it, there were a lot of women who had grown soft on obama who are now fired up. they're angry. they feel threatened, and they're part of the obama base that has really been enlivened by this. i do think in the long run, romney may look back and say on the women's issue, i really got that wrong and i got way too far out there. >> and latinos. yesterday, i talked to one of

the most prominent republican latinos in america who said he was appalled that the romney campaign or its super pac, i don't know which, was running ads attacking rick santorum for voting for sonya sotomayor for a lower court position, somebody not a democrat, said are they trying to drive mitt down to zero. he's losing the latino vote right now. too early, losing it 70-14. he's got to be among 45 if he wants to be president of the united states. this is having huge consequences among women and latinos, the two key votes in the november elections. >> and go back to the fact republicans have done this to themselves. mitt has done this to himself in the chase to try and drive santorum and gingrich away. obviously, most republicans don't think he believes any of this. we had this conversation last week. >> don't point at me. >> we had this conversation last week. >> you're talking to yourself.

>> that republicans don't believe mitt is that conservative. democrats' challenge will not let him get away with running back to the center and being the phony that he is. >> what doesn't add up in all of this, granted, this republican primary has moved the favorables for the republicans down, it has not played out the way we would have hoped it would have but you're still running neck and neck with barack obama on virtually every poll. that tells you how weak the president of the united states is. you can't just say the republicans have hurt themselves in this race, barack obama has hurt himself in the presidency. you're not just looking at a republican primary, you're looking at a general election where they both have records. that's what it's ultimately going to come down to and amazing it's running so close to the president. >> let me pick up on this. >> the weakness of the president. it was the president that put that hhs regulation out, it was the president that made it about birth control when it's really a religious liberty and economic liberty. when you poll it as a religious

or economic liberty message, which the republicans have failed to do so far, even with women, women do not want the government intruding into religious institutions. the reason obama did that specifically because his women were soft and he needs to gas up his base. he's talking about all these lefty things. >> actually, congress required hhs to come up with a regulation to implement the statute. this was not manufactured. this was intended to be a thoughtful substantive policy position. >> but republicans -- >> and they react -- >> i'm not done yet. >> by the way, all of the polling says you're wrong, that people do not see this. >> no. >> as a religious liberty issue. there's one other point. paul talked about latinos and the base. the other place where the base matters is in youth. these issues now, the social issues are things that young

people really really don't understand why this has absorbed our politics for 25 and 30 years. they're in a very different place. now, young people are energized in a way for the president and i think that will make a big difference. >> i think the energy is with the senior citizens who vote you saw them come out in 2010 for republicans and will come out in 2010. the president has hurt himself with the group that votes the most and the youth vote will not come out with the numbers in 2008. that will be a problem. >> we will take a quick break, getting more raw votes from ballot cams. we always hear about jobs leaving america. here's a chance to create jobs in america. oil sands projects, like kearl, and the keystone pipeline

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officially tallied in mississippi. rick santorum is developing a slight lead, 34-30%. 1,000 votes ahead of newt gingrich and newt gingrich and mitt romney tied, newt gingrich 200 votes ahead of mitt romney, and ron paul way, way behind. 17% of the vote now in, rick santorum has more than 1,000 lead. in alabama, only 2%, if that of the vote is in. once again, rick santorum is ahead. he's 566 votes ahead of newt gingrich with 29% for gingrich, 28% for mitt romney. there's a real battle for second place under way. santorum is ahead with 34% right now, but it's a very small number in alabama. i'm sure rick santorum and his supporters would love to see him atop both these states when all the vote is tallied later tonight. let's go to john king. i know we will be studying these two states very closely. we have reporters standing by as well. if you take a look at these two

states, mississippi and alabama right now, fiercely, fiercely tight. let's take a look at pascagoula in mississippi, birmingham in alabama. we have reporters in those two places. >> you watch the state start to fill in. right now, they're splitting it up. some counties for gingrich, some for romney, purple is santorum. this is a very important county for governor romney, winning by 51% of the vote. he needs to keep that margin. in the rural areas, santorum and gingrich, the split, if romney goes on to win either one of these states, this will be the story. you mentioned pascagoula is down here and jackson county the bottom and jackson next to it and biloxi county. you see santorum where we have official results, santorum ahead. this is important to governor romney as he did in south carolina. you have more affluent retirees -- >> northerners along the coast. >> pascagoula is here.

let me move next door. you can bring in the reporters whenever you're ready. to the state of alabama, a tight three-way race, results, different counties for different candidates. montgomery county for governor romney, if he wins in the population centers, that's been important. this is very important. birmingham is colored in jefferson county where dana bash is, 15% colored in for santorum, if that holds, a, a big county and b, critical. they think mississippi is a stronger state. if he has a chance in alabama, this is where he needs to win in the urban areas and suburbs around them. >> let me bring in shannon. he's in pascagoula. are you getting more official numbers. what's going on? >> reporter: absolutely. lots of activity at the jackson county election commission.

one by one the polling precincts are continuing to drop off their materials here. as you just mentioned, wolf, fresh numbers. no one else is getting these numbers. let me reveal them to you. out of five precincts, 31 pre-sixty in jackson county, these are the totals, mitt romney, 508 votes, rick santorum, 399 votes, newt gingrich, 360 votes, wolf, and ron paul, 58 votes. i'll read those back to you. mitt romney, 508, that's at 37.85%. rick santorum, 399, at 29.73%, newt gingrich has 360 votes, at 26.83% and again, ron paul, 58 votes at 4.32. we're continuing to talk with our contact, danny glascot. and we'll bring you more numbers. >> that's five precincts out of 30, is that right? >> reporter: correct, 5 out of

31. he's still loading them in one by one. a fairly quick process, wolf. snow thanks, shannon. we'll get back to you and dana as well. explain potentially what this means for romney, santorum and gingrich. tiny numbers. romney with a healthy lead. not a huge number but as shannon says, percentage-wise, jackson county not called because we don't have officials results. cnn is getting these ahead of official results. if this county fills in romney red, as you see next door in harrison county, you see governor romney just barely winning there, he needs to win along the coast and to carry the state, he probably needs to win this state by more than a couple hundred votes or in this case, eight votes. i just shrunk it down. we have a very tight three-way race and going county by county. when you look at this map in the distance, not so much purple,

but the percent of the population. this tells you one thing, we have a low turnout election. forest county, almost half the precincts reporting, 153 votes gives you the lead. you have a low turnout in mississippi. if that's continuing, you will look to bigger places, hines county, almost a third of the vote. >> if he maintains that, that's good for him. >> if he maintains that, that's good for him but the turnout might not be high enough. he's getting 50%. if he only doubles that there, it may not be enough to offset what's happening in the rural areas. romney's hope is he wins in the urban areas, i just pointed out, the suburbs and the other two candidates split in the more rural areas. to me, the most significant thing in the state of alabama is santorum is ahead.

it's very narrow. if he wins jefferson county -- >> almost a fenc15% of the popu in the entire state. dana bash is standing by. what's going on? >> reporter: right now, mitt romney is ahead, only slightly. 21% of the votes in jefferson county. mitt romney, 32, almost 33%, rick santorum at 30% and up here behind newt gingrich at 16%. mitt romney at 3,096. rick santorum at 2,872 and newt gingrich, 2,838. if you look at the difference here, it is not even 100 votes, a few hundred votes separating them. this is about 20% of the vote in. neck and neck here. this is coming in, every second they're updating these numbers.

these are the people doing it. this is state-of-the-art facility here in jefferson county. these two fellows, ricky hill and keith harris, they are putting the numbers in as they're getting the computerized information from around the county. that's why we're getting the information as it's coming in, again, changing every second. we could probably stand here and there you see, it's changed already since i gave you those numbers. it's neck and neck between the three of them. >> a real three-man race. let's assess. this is birmingham, jefferson county, 15% of birmingham livea this county? >> he is leading very narrowly, look at the difference value of reporters on the scene. romney, 307,000 votes and you look over here, 860. we are well ahead of the official vote tally. if you see this, that puts

governor romney in a more competitive position in terms of knowing the counties and places he needs to do well. a big enough margin? hard to tell. if you're governor romney, any place you have a population center and suburbs, this is where he does well in the urban areas and more importantly close-in suburbs and needs to win by big margins, you pop out to a statewide view and these numbers in the middle confuse you, gingrich, gingrich, santorum, santorum. most of the rural counties we see, that's where you have evangelical voters and tea party voters, governor romney does not do as well. any place you see a circle, montgomery county, 5% of the population, romney winning, is that a big enough margin? that's the question. down the coast, we watch a little later, baldwin county, down the gulfcoast, if governor

romney is to be competitive in alabama. the romney campaign believes with the help of the governor, they're more competitive in mississippi with official results, running third but still a lot more to come in as we wait and wait. looks like a little bit of checkerboard with three candidates competing fiercely. >> a third of the votes in mississippi, santorum slightly ahead, 33%, 31%, 30% for mitt romney. anything could change. you want to make a point? >> those numbers we just showed do not include the numbers shannon travis just gave us. jackson county, completely black and no official results, we know he has a slight lead. and some numbers are behind the cnn reporters because we have key reporters in these places. it does tell us these are the places to watch. if governor romney is going to come back and take away what is

now a santorum lead, that is one of the places that will happen. >> an incredibly tight three-man race in albaabama and mississip. polls coming in quickly since the polls closed. coming in quickly. i spoke earlier in the day with mitt romney the presidential front-runner. i'll share with you some of what he said coming up as well. [ todd ] hello? hello todd. just calling to let you know i'm giving you the silent treatment. so you're calling to tell me you're giving me the silent treatment? ummm, yeah. jen, this is like the eighth time you've called... no, it's fine, my family has free unlimited mobile-to-any-mobile minutes -- i can call all i want. i don't think you understand how the silent treatment works.

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very very close races in mississippi and alabama unfolding right now. here are the latest numbers. more than a third of the vote in mississippi is now in, 37% to be precise. rick santorum continuing to maintain a slight lead over newt gingrich and mitt romney. about 1500 votes, santorum ahead of gingrich right now. 33% for santorum, 31% for

gingrich, 29% for romney, ron paul way way behind. in alabama, we now have 6% of the vote in, similarly, rick santorum slightly ahead of newt gingrich and mitt romney, 34% for santorum, 29% for gingrich, 28% for romney. 1500 vote difference. santorum is ahead of gingrich. now 7% of the vote in alabama is coming in. we're not obviously going to be able to make any projections until we get a lot more numbers. this is shaping up to be a fascinating night in both of these southern states. mitt romney, he is the front-runner. i had a chance to speak with him not that long ago. governor, thanks very much. i know you have a limited amount of time. let's get right to afghanistan because the situation there seems to be going from bad to wor worse. even newt gingrich said this. he says, i think it's going to get substantially worse, not better and i think that we are ri risking -- we are risking young

men and women in a mission that may frankly not be do-able. is it time to start getting out of afghanistan much more quickly than president obama has in mind, which is he wants everyone out by the end of 2014? >> it's certainly time on a regular basis to review our mission there and see what progress we're making and not to make decisions based upon some actions by a crazed gunman. we don't determine our foreign policy based on something of that nature. from time-to-time, we have to assess what the process is there. i'm very disappointed the president has not over the last year or two talked about what's happening in afghanistan, what progress is being made, described a timetable that makes sensor described why his timetable makes sensor not. my own view, we have to listen to our own commanders on the ground and will hear input from general allen in a few days.

let's hear their reports and what prospects we have of having a successful mission and turning over as soon as possible the responsibility for the security of afghanistan to the security troops there. >> do you agree or disagree with gingrich that the mission may not be, in his word, "do-able?" >> yeah. there's no certainty in a matter of foreign policy of this nature of course. one recognizes that as one goes into a conflict. but one, over time, collects information to see what progress is occurring and what setbacks are occurring. you don't make an abrupt shift in policy because of the actions of one crazed deranged person. of course, you assess your prospects over time, again, given the input of the people closest to the action. at this stage, to say we're going to throw in the towel without getting the input of general allen or actually making trips to afghanistan and meeting with leaders there and meeting with our commanders there and troops there, that wouldn't make

a lot of sense. i'm more deliberate when it comes to the lives of or sons and daughters and mission of the united states of america. >> the super pac that supports rick santorum has come out with a very tough commercial, very tough attack ad against you. i will play a little clip and get your response. >> mitt created romney care, the blueprint for obama-care. just like obama, romney left massachusetts $1 begin in debt. who can win? rick santorum. >> i will give you a chance to respond to rick santorum's super pa pac. >> well, you know, it's been interesting the fact check has looked at rick santorum's claims over the last several ads and the things he said. i think in almost every case they said rick santorum's attacks have been baseless and wrong. i think they have something called pinocchios, they gave him four pinocchios or something like that. i won't get into discussing various ads. obviously, we left massachusetts

with over a $2 begin rainy day fund and a balanced budget. so i'm afraid his conclusions are exactly wrong. you know, senator santorum is at the desperate end of his campaign and trying to boost his prospects and frankly misrepresenting the truth is not a good way of doing that. >> why do you think he's at the desperate end of his campaign? >> he's far behind in the delegate count, far behind in the popular vote count. if you look at the math of how many delegates he'd have to win to become the nominee, it's a very difficult road for him. at this stage, he's looking for some way to try and gain ground. i understand that. i would hope you'd use truth as one of the pillars of your strategy opposed to trying to come up with one attack after the other that frankly has been determined by those who take a careful look from the outside to be inaccurate. >> one of the criticisms you've

leveled against senator santorum when he was a sitting u.s. senator was he repeatedly voted to raise the nation's debt ceiling. here's the question to you. if you're elected president of the united states, will you make a commitment not to raise the nation's debt ceiling anymore? >> i made it very clear when this last question came up about raising the debt ceiling i would not have raised that debt ceiling without getting an agreement to cut, cap and balance the budget. i continue to believe that's the right course. if i'm president, i will cut, cap and get america on track to get a balanced budget. that's what we have to do. if we don't do those things, we should say, look, we're not going to raise the debt ceiling. we're not going to keep opening up our children's future to politicians that want to spend away that future by borrowing from the chinese and others. my view is very simple and straightforward. my plan is to get america on track for a balanced budget by cutting and capping federal spending? >> can i understand that to mean

that's a commitment that no more increases in the nation's debt ceiling if you're president? sn>> any increases in the debt ceiling will have to be accompanied by compensating cuts in federal spending and making sure we get ourselves on track to having a balanced budget. 0 governor, thanks very much. we had a limited amount of time. appreciate you spending a few moments with us. appreciate it very much. >> thanks, wolf. good to be with you. >> you heard mitt romney, the front-runner, say rick santorum in his words at the desperate end of his campaign. not necessarily. 50% of the vote is now in, santorum slightly ahead of gingrich and romney. look how close. only 1700 votes separates santorum and gingrich, 33% for santorum, 31% for gingrich and romney. and half the vote.

in alabama, dwell% of the vote is in. santorum seems to be building his lead slightly, 34% for santorum, 30% for newt gingrich, 28% for mitt romney, only 5% for ron paul. with 12% of the vote in alabama, doing a bit better than his two rivals. anderson, i think it's fair to say as we watch both of these states, it could still go when all the dust settles anyway. >> is rick santorum at the desperate end of his campaign as governor romney says? >> i think governor romney should probably hope he's not because he needs rick santorum and newt gingrich as you see in both these races. if it weren't for them splitting the very conservative, evangelical, tea party voters, mitt romney would not be within sort of a position to win in either mississippi or alabama. so the fact that they're splitting the vote, whether it's desperate or not, he ought to pay them both to stay in a

little longer. >> we've had so many long nights, all the way back to iowa. >> you remember that? >> i try to forget, in which there's been this close voting between romney and santorum. time after time after time. it does seem to me the argument he has that this should be a two-man race or this has become a two-man race has gained a great deal of credibility over time. >> it has because so far what we have is newt gingrich with one state. >> right. >> south carolina. which seems like 100 years ago. you can't. it will be very hard for newt gingrich -- he can stay in the race. it will be hard to see him as viable if he doesn't do something big. i think newt gingrich has to win something. if rick santorum wins both these states, it's blow to both. >> then there's a question what happens if sometime soon, maybe not tonight, newt gingrich gets out, who would get newt gingrich's votes?

>> rick santorum, wouldn't he? >> if people in the romney campaign i talked to said, you know what, rick santorum would get about half. they believe, through all their extrapolation, they would get 30%. now, that leaves some undecided, but they say not necessarily. it wouldn't all go to rick santorum. >> in some of these states, if 70% went to santorum and 30% went to romney, santorum wins a lot of states. >> that's why he needs both of them. >> our contributors, do you guys believe 30% of votes would go to gingrich would go to mitt romney? >> it's impossible to know. depends. every race creates a dynamic for the next race and depends what state you're talking about? new york and northern states and louisiana and other states, different regions of the country. certainly, i got a tweet earlier, 100% of santorum votes will not go to newt and 100% of newt votes will not go to santorum.

it is a mix. >> it would raise santorum to make him competitive with romney. it might not change the delegate math. once you get to proportional, if you start to get about half the delegates instead of a third, you begin to have a shot at this. there's. >> many states romney is advantaged in that are winner take all which gives him even more delegates. it definitely would give santorum a shot. >> we don't know but here's something we do know. it's been consistent. in all but santorum's trifecta, those caucuses, electability has beat purity. in every one of those cases whether or not they voted for him, voters said they thought romney would get the nomination and thought romney was stronger against obama. was the strongest against obama. that showed up again in these exit polls by 2-1. santorum would have to sh show -- he'd have to make gains in electability. there's a difference between

being a message candidate and get-er-done candidate. >> mary the cable gal? >> i was going to say jeff foxworthy was for romney in mississippi. i think that will make the difference. that, we do know. we know santorum has not gotten close to winning electability in the exits. >> if newt wants to live off the land, he has to get on the air. if i'm working for newt, what candy says will trouble me a lot. he has to get attention from the press. he's not as newsworthy if he loses both these southern states. he only carried georgia and south carolina. what does he do, gets out as rati rational mr. fleischer advises or crazy mr. begala charges, he says more outrageous thing because attention must be paid to newt gingrich. >> we have correspondents through alabama an mississippi. we'll check in with them in a moment.

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significant numbers of votes are now being officially counted. it's very very close. rick santorum continuing to maintain his lead in mississippi, almost 70% of the vote is now in, 68%, he is slightly ahead of newt gingrich and mitt romney. 33% for santorum, 31% for gingrich, 30% for romney. he's about 16, almost 1700 votes, santorum ahead of newt gingrich right now and mitt romney, very very close, a fight for second place. once again, only 68% of the vote is in.

there's still plenty of votes yet to be counted in mississippi. we will be digging deeper, where those outstanding votes are. you see it just changed right there, santorum maintaining his lead of 1,727 votes ahead of newt gingrich. let's go to alabama. a quarter of the vote is now in, a significant number. similarly, santorum maintain ing a bigger lead in alabama than mississippi, 1500 votes ahead of newt gingrich, mitt romney so far third place in alabama, 35% for santorum, 30% for gingrich, 28% for romney. changing, only 5% for ron paul. still very close. 75% of the vote still outstanding in alabama. let's go to john king. donna bash is over there. we're watching these counties, the similar pattern in alabama and mississippi developing, the bigger urban concentrated areas, romney does better than the more

rural areas. >> we'll start in mississippi and go back to dana who has numbers beyond what we have. watch for the dots, an urban area. governor romney does better. jacks jackson, not a huge city, the kcap toll. is the anarea where the government is based. some of the barber family working for romney. mississippi, low turnout could be the factor. if romney falls just short in miss mis, low turnout could be the issue. you see him winning with 36% of the vote, but look how low the turnout is. come back down to hines county, which is the critical county. >> almost 9%. >> that's where the state capital is, the biggest lead, probably the biggest you'll find county by county. it's 83% of the vote already, so he can't count on many more votes there. >> take a look at the full number, 72% of these votes are

now in. but look at how close it is between santorum and gingrich. 33% to 32%. they're not very far -- that's a significant percentage of the vote in mississippi. >> and governor romney currently running third. if he's to make this up, you have a small population center in the western part of the state, and we have shannon travis down here in jackson county. only 35% of the vote here. a place where romney is winning, again, the turnout is low and the margin, is that enough? to make up the vote enough, to move up here, he's winning but by a tiny amount. and in the places he's winning, is there enough room to make up the math? it's a key question for mississippi. if you move to alabama, 26% of the votes state-wide in. romney running third. santorum, and again, if you look, this has switched. this was romney earlier. this is now santorum. only 34% of the vote, and mobile county, 9% of the vote. that's critical along the gulf

coast is romney is to be competitive in alabama. dana bash sin birmingham. in the population center, in the suburbs around it, romney tends to win, but the turnout is low. is that enough to offset what is happening in the rural areas? this is where dana bash is, this is 15% of the state population. romney ahead with 34% of the count ay written. >> let's go to dana and see what she's got. do you have more numbers out there? >> that's right. i'm going to show you the numbers as they are right now. i want to show you the activity that is going on to bring the numbers in. again, we still have cars pulling up, one after the other, a steady stream with again, the inmates from the local county jail helping them do this. stewart clark wants to swing around here, this is the vault where the information is going. but come with me back here, because i want to get to the screen where they're flashing the numbers for the entire county here of jefferson county.

john, you mentioned this is very important because it's about 15% of the overall state of alabama, coming from here in jefferson county. before, when i went outside, it was about 41% of the county reporting. now, i think it's about 44%, 45%. let's look at the hard numbers. the raw numbers, i should say. right now, and look, you still have mitt romney leading. 7,877. rick santorum -- excuse me, newt gingrich is right behind, 6,691. and santorum, 6,685. i mean, wow, they could not be any closer. looking at the percentages, romney, 34.8%. rick santorum, 29.54%, and newt gingrich, 29 nig.56%. it's very close, but at least right now, with at this point, nearly half of the machines coming in from here in jefferson

county, romney doing well, and both of you mentioned this particular county is important to romney because he does need to run the numbers up, especially in the outskirts of jefferson county, tends to be more affluent. those are typical romney voters that he needs to get out and get out big to do well in the state. >> here with john, earlier, romney was ahead of santorum by about 500 votes. the new numberles that haven't been counted yetering he's up by about 1,200 in the jefferson county in alabama. >> it's a gain of about 2,800 votes for romney, a little more than that in the county, a gain for both of these candidates as well. the question then is if you assume this is just about 500 votes, 400 votes for gingrich, and santorum, so let's beam up, those numbers have updates, our numbers have almost caught up with the numbers on the wall, let's go state-wide, romney has closed a little bit but not

enough. in the state of alabama, he seems to be far enough behind, although we're at 28%. you see the numbers changing as we speak. we have been waiting and waiting for the states to fill in. alabama is the tougher state for the romney campaign if you ask us. right now, he's winning where he would need to win, in huntsville, birmingham, we still don't have knk from mobile. win in those areas. in the rural area, it's a germ r gingrich/santorum tradeoff. if you go to some of the rural counties, santorum with a healthy, 12% lead, but turnout is low. in both of the states, you have relatively low turnout. we need to be careful and keep going, and the places thereat are out matter quite a bit. >> it looks like santorum, at least as of now, is in better shape in alabama than he is in mississippi. >> in alabama right now, he has a five percentage point lead, but we're at 28% of the vote.

you can jump especially with a major population center out. in mobile, 71% of the vote there, romney leading, but is that margin big enough where dana was, about half of the vote, a little less than half of the vote. there's a chance for things to change here. with only 28% of the vote in, here is what is getting interesting. 80% of the vote in mississippi. and this is close. romney now running third. this is what they thought was their best shot tonight, the state of mississippi. he's running third with almost 80% of the vote counted. that's only about 5,000 votes. can he make it up? yes, but as the map fills in, he better do it quickly. >> an extremely interesting hour coming up because a lot can still change. 21% of the vote is still to be counted in some of the areas where perhaps gingrich is doing well, romney is doing well. we'll see what is going on. much more of the coverage coming up at the top of the hour.

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