have said it -- i will say it again -- this campaign is not just about a name on a ballot. it's about saving the soul of america. it is driven by an unshakeable optimism that lies within the heart of every american citizen. we know that our future's brighter and better in these troubled times. we have been knocked down. we have been tested. but we don't accept that an america like this nation has limits. we know america's the land of opportunity. we still get up every morning and thank god that we are americans. [cheers and applause] we also know that with hard work and with strong leadership, with a president that will tell the

truth, with a president that will live with integrity, that our greatest days as a nation are ahead of us, thanks to the american people. tonight, we have taken one more step toward restoring the promise of tomorrow. tomorrow, we wake up and we start again. and the next day, we'll do the same. and so will go, day by day, step by step, door by door, heart to heart. there will be good days. there will be bad days, always long hours, never enough time to get everything done. but on november 6, we are going to stand united, not only having won an election, but having saved a future. [cheering] it's time -- it's time -- it's time to unbelievable ourselves. it's time to believe in ourselves, it's time to believe in america. i am asking to you join our cause. we need your energy and your conviction and your commitment. i am asking for to you pledge

your support at mitt romney.com. get online. we need your voice and your vote in this campaign. i am asking to you join in the fight for our freedom and insure that tomorrow will be better than today. let's go forward together and restore the promise of america, together. let's fight for the america we love. thank you and god bless this great land. god bless the united states of america. thank you, guys! >> megyn: mitt romney at his campaign headquarters tonight in boston, massachusetts, a state he won handily, over 70%. and you can see the adoration of the crowd there that has showed up to celebrate that victory. governor romney, being introduced as he often is by his wife, ann, who came out and talked about what women care about in this country, saying it's jobs that has been in the news, virtually every day for the past week, on other subjects. she is saying that women care

about jobs, the debt, entitlement debt. i want to clarify something we heard earlier that governor romney and senator santorum had not called each other, saying there was nothing to talk about. but now we are told, they will speak tomorrow morning by phone and that's what they always do and they will plan to do that tomorrow as well. governor romney nrecent weeks has been a little more forthcoming about his own failings, copping to having made mistakes on the campaign trail. tonight, we heard that, saying, i have listened and learned and hopefully become a better candidate because of it. referencing a discussion on the huckabee forum, meeting a man with david macarthur, who asked what he would do for veterans of this country, who suffered injuries like his son who, suffered a traumatic brain injury. and it was quite a moment. romney referencing that again, going on to say that we'll get this economy back on track when we get government out of the way, asking folks to imagine what would happen if barack obama spent four more years in

the white house can no one to answer to, finishing up with his campaign, his quote, on the move. tomorrow, we wake up and we start again. want to tell you that while governor romney was speaking, fox news projected that he has taken second in the state of tennessee, behind rick santorum, that was a three-way race between governor romney, rick santorum and newt gingrich. gingrich and santorum were thought to be battling it out there. but mitt romney has come in second in the state of tennessee tonight. >> bret: at the top of the hour, the polls closed in idaho and north dacoat a. we don't have anything to call yet. but here's the big race that we have been watching all night, as you look at idaho and north dakota, ohio. there you can see spread right now. a little more than 10,000 votes. but again, different areas of the state coming in. so far, 59% of the expected vote

in. the back and forth we have seen in this lead, santorum has had a big lead. it started to shrink in the past few minutes as karl rove mentioned, some of the urban areas and the suburbs in the big cities, starting to come nperhaps. we will talk to karl in just a bit about that. we can also call now that newt gingrich will finish third in ohio and ron paul will finish fourth. we can call that now. >> megyn: and call virginia as l. >> bret: we did that a long time ago. >> megyn: in case you were confused about the states that mitt romney won -- >> bret: newt gingrich wins georgia, wide spread there. >> megyn: and for rick santorum, winning the states of tennessee and oklahoma. fox news projecting that mitt romney will take second in tennessee, leaving newt gingrich in third place in that state

tonight. >> bret: okay, from here, let's bring in former governor of alaska, former vice-presidential candidate, sarah palin, fox news contributor. your thoughts on this evening? >> well, it was a good night for all four candidates. i think that some predictions came true, with some of these victories and a couple of surprises. i think all eyes, as you have mentioned are on ohio, i think the significance will be that santorum wins or comes so close to defeating romney there, despite being outspent 4-1 and what that tells us is that it is not all about the money. no g.o.p. nominee will have the financial advantage going up against obama's billion dollars and the media machine in the general. seso we can't count on the greatest war chest. >> megyn: governor palin, welcome. i want to ask you about the exit polls tonight. for example, in the state of georgia and also in ohio, voters were asked, if your guy doesn't

win, will you support the ultimate nominee? in georgia, 93% of the republican voters said, either probably or definitely, i am going to support the republican nominee. in ohio, 86%. what does that suggest to you? >> it suggests that the orgwill be there, the enthusiasm will be there for the g.o.p. nominee. at this time, i say this with all respect to governor mitt romney, he has the most delegates so we can deem him the frontrunner. but he is not a real strong and enthusiasm-garnering frontrunner right now. and mitt romney, if he is going to be the nominee, he and his team have to figure out how to get people enthused about this. how to convince the american voters who will participate in the general that he most -- blightly and starkly contrasts his ideas and solutions to get us on the right track, versus

obama's failed social policies. not being a strong frontrunner, with the victory and it is money spent for the victories tonight in these primaries is significant. i believe, though, that like most voters, i am going to be there for that nominee whether romney or anyone else. but he has to work hard at drumming up the enthusiasm. >> bret: what do you think about newt gingrich's path here? after a big win in georgia, he says he is going to continue in the southern strategy -- alabama, mississippi and kansas. what do you think about his chances in this race? >> well, i think that the state that knows him best, his home state of georgia, he having such a strong showing and a victory there is quite significant. his path forward, it is clear, as evidenced by getting secret service protection, starting tomorrow and has promised to continue on. he wants the competition, the debate, the ideas discussed to

continue. and that's good. as i have said, competition makes all of these candidates stronger. we have to remember, we have five men runs for president. any of the four on the g.o.p. ticket are stronger than barack obama. that fifth candidate running for president, newt gingrich, one of the four. i am glad he is staying in it. >> bret: right. quickly, both the santorum and the gingrich campaign point out that if the other wasn't in the race that they would be able to take on mitt romney for the non-romney vote, effectively. dow do you agree with that? >> boo-hoo. of course, they want one another to drop out. but i don't support that idea. no, i think the competition should continue. he who most starkly contrasts himself, against the orwelian obama speak at the obama press conference, as he spew this is nonsense about another unfunded bailout that he wants to jam down our throats without any constitutional constraints,

that's just one example we heard from obama today, things he wants to do wrong to this country. he who can most starkly contrast his ideas against that will go forward. at this point, it doesn't make any sense for anybody to drop out and concede that they can't be the nominee. >> bret: more with governor palin. thank you. >> megyn: want to give that back now to washington with "fox news sunday" anchor chris wallace is there. >> the big question, looking at the numbers in ohio at this point, santorum leads by 13,000 votes with more than 60% of the vote in. so then the question becomes. why can't we call this race for rick santorum? karl rove, why can't we? >> because the big counties that are favoring romney are showing a smaller percentage of the vote in.

suburbs are -- basically, we have a burve of big urban and suburban counties. >> are santorum counties out? >> yeah, but it's marian and ottawa, marion is a small, rural county, ottawa is near toledo and could be a romney county and one other suburban county, suburban cleveland county of medine alikely to be a romney counselee. so we have seen it as big as 16,000 and closed to 11,000 and back out now -- >> 12,000 right now. >> 12,000 votes. >> you would think, looking at this, though, with the big counties out, it is going cotoclose for romney. but will it close enough to overtake santorum. that's the part we look at this back and forth and cannot figure this one out yet. >> i was going on ask you, karl because you and i -- joe's contacts inside the romney

campaign, not so good. [laughter] >> but we have contacts. we have been emailing them. they seem tong they are going to win. are they overly confident? this looks very close. >> you know, look, they have a better handle. they have people inside precincts so they know to a granular level, what's out. weather they are dliewding themselves and dliewding us, i don't know. but if you are in the war room, you have the access to the county level data that we have access, to but you literally know the individual precincts and have a sense of how those are looking. >> joe, let's talk about tonight because -- let's assume santorum wins, if santorum wins of seven primaries, forget the 3 caucuses, santorum would have won oklahoma, tennessee and the big prize of ohio, romney would have won virginia and massachusetts. it seems to me, under those circumstances, even though

romney would get more delegates than santorum, it's a santorum victory. >> if he can pull out ohio and keep tit's a big victory for him. the problem is that then it's a delegate game. and that's where in ohio, he hasn't even filed -- >> conversely, i want to get karl on this, but conversely, joe, if romney wins and santorum only has two state it's tennessee and oklahoma and romney has four and is finishing second in georgia and tennessee and perhaps oklahoma, this is a huge night for -- we can be talking about 3,000 votes. >> that's what -- it's unfair about the process is that literally, when this thing is over tcould be 3- or 4,000 votes, depends who gets the headlines. >> karl, your brief thought about ohio swinging the entire momentum. >> it can swing the momentum with regard to the vote. but look, at the end of the night, romney will have received more votes and more delegates

and is likely to receive more than his competitor -- all of his competitors combined. >> but ohio's the big prize. >> so we have a lot of nothing down here. but at least, you understand why we don't have a result yet. >> bret: this was good nothing. >> megyn: that's a nothing-burger. >> prime nothing, myself. >> megyn: thank you. >> usda. >> bret: that's right. just in on the rope line, rick santorum said this, quote, for us to be where we are is huge, 12-1, being outspent, it's awesome. that was the quote. well, he was in the race for the republican presidential nomination, governor rick perry has his take on super tuesday, coming up. look, every day we're using more and more energy.

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call. take a look at the states. newt gingrich won georgia, as expected. mitt romney won massachusetts, as expected, along with vermont and virginia. rick santorum, two big wins in oklahoma and tennessee. but we have not yet called the critical state of ohio, which at this hour is too close to call. you heard karl rove projecting that mitt romney still had some major counties for him, yet to be counted in both. we are going to check in with our decision desk and see what they have to say with 68% reporting. you can see the spread, very close with rick santorum up 38-36%. we will get an update from the decision desk in just a moment. >> bret: here with us, a former presidential candidate, texas governor rick perry. thanks for joining us. >> great to be with you. >> bret: you endorsed newt gingrich. what are your thoughts on tonight? obviously, he had a big win in george georgia.

>> it wasn't a super night for anyone, when you think about it being super tuesday. there were night wins for everyone and everyone can stand up and say that they accomplished some goals and there will be folk who is say they accomplished all the goals they wanted to hit on, but the fact is that no one won everything they needed to win, which i think is a reflection of the republican primary voter not settling in. mitt not being able to close the south with the southern states. obviously, newt's going to have a very good audience to go into and talk about the issues of energy independence and the energy plan that he is laying out. when you talk about louisiana and texas and alabama and the states that are left out in front of us here, having newt's plan in place. i think his path to victory is still there and it's one that -- when you look at the candidates, there is not anybody who brings everything, not only a social

conservative, but a fiscal conservative, a 10th amendment-believing individual going to washington, d.c. and push back on the status quo in washington so that states, you know, we are in continual fight with this administration, whether it's about health care or whether it's about how to edcageicate our children. we have a huge fight in the state right now, suing the federal government again over the issue of wre right on this issue. we are doing what we can do toget the women, low-income women, the health care needs, but because we are a pro-life and a state that believes in protecting independent -- i should say, protecting the innocent life, this administration won't send us our dollars back to the state of texas. i mean, it's just a fascinating fight that i think that newt, when he -- articulates to the public about the 10th amendment and why it's so important to have a president that respects that, he really

shines. on energy policy, 10th amendment, nobody's better than newt. when you get to the bottom line that americans are looking for somebody who is not a washington insider, not a wall street insider, someone who has the ability to swim in that shark tank in wash d. washington, d.c. and devolve the power back to the states. that's what newt gingrich is all about. >> megyn: governor, just to shift your focus on the race in general, for a minute. obviously, you were part of it for a while. it's gone on for several months. a lot of republicans are getting weary. and they are ready for it to be over, you know? they remember when you were in and they have had several loves in this contest, governor. but the folk who is came up with this extendedton contest stand behind tsaying this will ultimately help the republicans with millions of eyeballs watching the big speeches. they go after barack obama in a tough battle to unseat an incumbent president. others, however, think this is

very damaging to the republican field. where do you stand on it? >> i'm one of those that believes that the -- you know, the strength of your candidates is what it is all about. obviously, we got four individuals who, against barack obama are head and shoulders better than him. so whichever one of our candidates we finally fall in behind, you are going to have the full force and power of the republican party, the excitement's going to be there. we are going to be working hard. who it's going to be, i think is certainly not settled yet. but those that want to maim a -- an individual and anoint someone right off the bat, sorry, that's not the way america works. it is not going to be that way. we are going to to have our cont and have people get up and debate. but again, i go back to the individual who can stand on the stage, who has the history of intellectually engaging and debating barack obama, with the ideas and the history, frankly of a balanced budget and

10th amendment supporting concept is newt gingrich. >> megyn: governor perry, thank you so much, sir. all the best. >> always good to be with you. thank you, so long. >> bret: the race is too close to call. in the bellwether state of ohio between mitt romney and rick santorum. stay here as we track the results. at any moment, we are going back-- here we come, after the break. they don't look like they care. >> bret: that's all right. i'm phil mickelson, pro golfer.

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but as a person that had been helped by their work. i was just blown away. life's been good to me. i feel like one of the luckiest guys in the world. ♪ >>r. >> bret: welcome back. we can project that rick santorum will finish a distant second in massachusetts, leaving ron paul to finish third. we projected that mitt romney would win. newt gingrich will be fourth in the state of north dacoat a. it looks good for rick santorum at this hour. >> megyn: all eyes at this hour are on ohio, where we expected the drama to be tonight. and indeed, it is. we are going to do something we don't often do. we are going to walk over to the decision desk. >> bret: let me help you. >> megyn: what a gentleman. >> bret: yes. here you go. careful. >> megyn: we are going on find out directly from the guys at

the decision desk. why? what's the deal? it's getting late. we want to call ohio. but these are the guy who is control the information. chris, there's your plug, what's going on? these are the geniuses. they are usually the first to call the states, 9 times out of 10. ohio -- we can't do it. why? >> you are right. they are awesome at hathey do. we will call it as soon as possible. but here's the thing n. ohio, the votes are panning out short what have we upon expected. romney is doing well in metro cleave planned cincinnati-way, but it's close in columbus and the area that is the bellwether, the deciding part of the state. so we have to wait t. wouldn't be agan election night if we weren't waiting for cuyahoga.

they are a famously late-counting precincts. they are famously close. >> megyn: why do you think karl rove feels like it's romney's to lose? he is talking about the counties that are pro-romney have not all reported? >> there are key places we are looking in. not just in suburban cleveland. but also down in the southern part of the state, in the southwestern part of the state, where there is a lot more vote that could be a good romney vote. we are also waiting to finish up the vote counting in western, rural counties, where you could see a good number for santorum. so they both have a couple of rabbits. romney looks like the lead has been consistent. but there is too much variable. >> megyn: what about the eastern part of the state that were thought to be friendly to rick

santorum? >> this was a disappointment for santorum because if you look at youngstown, if you look at warren, ohio, those are places where santorum campaigned and wanted to do well, hasn't done the number that he wanted. he's trailing to romney, but he didn't get what he needed to get there. >> megyn: is this a surprise to you? that ohio is this close at this hour? >> nothing in ohio does in an election. ever surprises me. >> megyn: can you rest of you complent on that? is that true? [laughter] >> megyn: that's a yes. bret, back to you. >> bret: we will keep checking g in. all night long, we have been talk about this delegates. here's how it breaks down. take a look at this. this is a guilt o.p. convention floor, all the republican delegates that will be going on the g.o.p. convention in tampa in august. there are 20,286 across the country. now, 1,144, you can see the shaded area, are needed to win

the nomination. that's about half the total number. so far, as you can see here, only 16% of them have been allocated. you can see the different color thr.s romney in the yellow, santor num blue, gingrich and paul. but you see how much more you have to go to get the needed delegates to get the nomination. randy evans is a senior adviser for the gingrich campaign, former counsel to the speaker of the house. and karl rove. we thought we would have a battle of the white boards here. first to you, randy, how does speaker gingrich get this nomination? how do you plan to say, you can have the number of delegates? >> well, first is, this idea that somewhat the nomination's over that it has gone, that nobody can actually get the number now or that governor romney has it. let's look at this board, which karl would appreciate, three big

numbers. one is techas, 152 delegates. eight winner-take-all state, 3 qoo. but the big number is 5 03 are not bound. have you 1,000 delegates at play across the country. they are at play in terms of states like texas, where there are big numbers. the other big board to take a look at are these three numbers, the last part of the process. the process is started slow, even tonight, we will barely have a couple hundred delegates for governor romney, maybe 300, if you thought about it as a building that was 111 stories high, he would be at the third floor. but it ends big. in this two-week period, in the last part of may, you have 75 delegates on the 22nd, have you texas with 152 on may 29. and then on june 5, have you 264 in one day, almost 500 delegates

at the end. how does newt gingrich do that? basically, it's making sure that we have safety nets and we have states in process where we can do really well. we had a big win in georgia, the biggest prize of the night. now we go to alabama/mississippi. from there, to louisiana, the states are collections of states throughout the process that permit us to have plateaus and have valleys and have peaks. tonight, was a big peak. if you look across the state, georgia, he did exceptionally well. >> bret: okay, karl. the floor's yours. >> this is plausible. it means keeping alive until the end of may and winning the texas primary. but in order to stay alive until the end of may, have you to keep winning. the problem is this -- take a look at next week, alabama and mississippi. i think the gingrich campaign is planning on winning those two states. they have 84 delegates up for grabs and six national committee members.

but if you look at tonight, outside of georgia and you look at tennessee and oklahoma, the winner had on average, 35%, the second place finisher, 28. and the third-place finisher, 26. the problem is, these are -- these delegates will be awarded proportionally, so next week, let's assume the candidates run as well as they did tonight in oklahoma and tennessee. the first-place finisher will get 32 delegates and second place, 27 and the third place finisher, 25. the problem is, speaker gingrich was the third-place finisher in the south outside of georgia, which means he would get 25, two behind the guy in front of him and five mind the guy in front of him. you cannot win the nomination if, like in tonight in virginia, you know, mitt romney got 41 delegates at minimum. to zero for gingrich and santorum. you know, it's plausible to say stay alive, win in texas. but between now and then, you have to close the gap.

you can't close the gap a delegate or two or three or four at a time, particularly when you ran tonight, third in tennessee and oklahoma. >> bret: okay. randy, your response? >> that's why the big -- this big winger take all 382 is important. karl's exactly right. have you to win outside the south. the most important part for us is to have the calendar in such way way that we have states with the peaks and valleys coming. we have a floor, but we have the opportunity for big wins in states around the country. >> bret: last thing, randy. the big decision here, the big strategy is to trite try to prevent mitt romney from getting to 1144. but if you and rick santorum are in this race, doesn't getting all the delegates on the white board really become tough? >> well, winner-take-all states force that issue. in a winner-take-all state, there is only one winner, no

second or third place. there is only first place. and you know, we expect as the race moves to states where everybody's competitive on an even playing field, newt wins. >> bret: okay, thank you. the battle of the white boards? fox news can project that rick santorum will win north north d. and fox can project that newt gingrich will finish fourth in north dacoat a. fox news projecting that rick santorum will win north dakota. >> he's a winner in oklahoma, tennessee and north dakota. so far. ohio is too close to call. mitt romney, rick santorum, separated by a few hundred votes, tight race, what is it now, britt? >> narrowed a bit. we are watching it every moment. next, why we can't call ohio

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razor-thin marge and i know what a contest between these two in a very important state. the state of ohio here. the stakes there cannot be understated i want to tablet viewers that mitt romney's political director called ohio a gif fight in a phone booth and said in the romney camp, it is a must win for santorum, suggesting it will be very hard for rick santorum to get money and momentum, to continue on for much longer if he doesn't win ohio. look at the number there is. it is way too close to call. that's too close to call -- way too close to call, according to the decision desk. those are my words, but that's essentially what they were telling me. bill has been tracking the billboard. bill, why can't we come close? >> it's a browns/bengals game. this is like waaaay. 81% reporting, santorum with a 1.-point lead, 38-37%.

you can look at the state based on the country of ohio, the countryside of ohio and the city and the big-city votes here. this is franklin county, capitol city, columbus located here. have you a little more than half the vote in. this is where mitt romney really wanted to run up the score. he has a 5-point edge and there is a lot of vote in franklin county. so that's part of the reason why we have this mix together to try to figure out whether or not we could make a call, because have you returns in franklin county and it's really growing in delaware, north of columbus, this is just a bit more than a fraction of the vote being right now. and romney, has a 3-point lead there. that's one reason y. you are missing a big vote in the central part of the state in columbus. you are missing a big part of the vote in cuyahoga county. this is cleveland, romney has a 16-point lead, but the vote margin is not safe enough to make a call. if you compare the vote from

cuyahoga 4 years ago in 2008, here's mccain, beating huckabee, 46, 56, about 60,000 votes. where are we right now? you are 20,033, a little less than 40,000. so you have 20,000 to in in in cahoge a. for rick santorum, he is doing really well here. look at the could you wanties. what's interesting here in the southeast, he is doing well and the western side of the state. along his home state of pennsylvania, mitt romney's leading in two of these counties, youngstown and also trummible, to the north there. that would be a surprise, if that sticks with romney beating him in those two areas. so the big cities, the big counties, a big part of that vote is still out tonight. that's the reason why this is too close to call. in ohio, yet again. >> so interesting. i didn't get the browns/bengals thing, but i understand the red

and the orange. >> that's the colors. [chuckles] >> by the way, i think the margin for an automatic recount in ohio, i think is 25%. i will check that -- the margin. all night long. we are watching the exit polls and we are looking at ohio. >> bret, this is getting very interesting tonight. here is why. let's take a look at the numbers here. romney's election mantra has been that his life in the private sector and also partly as a mr. fix-it of the olympics has been the major selling point and the ohio voters seem to agree with that. that counts for them a lot. they believe a president is better prepared if his background is in business and he wins that margin soundly. and ohio has been hit very hard and for those who say that's their top issue, they are going for romney. but votersush the age of 30

favoring rick santorum this evening. they continue to give ron paul strong support. romney was in third, though nsome say he's an an inability to connect with the younger voters. but the next one may be why we are seeing rick santorum in such a strong position tonight in ohio because of his ability to connect with the blue-collar workers and, quote, average americans narcotic state of ohio. he has an 11 percentage point lead on this measure. they said that they believe he's the one who understands their problems the best. romney was down by a significant measure at 22%. his ability to connect with the voters, mitt romney, perhaps impaired a bit by the nascar comment and the two cadillac comment that got so much attention in the time period running up to this vote. this is a look at that picture in ohio -- ooh, coming in and out. this seems to be my thing tonight. we will keep poring over the

numbers. >> megyn: it's the spooky poll. >> "phantom of the opera." >> megyn: not everyone has that. >> bret: let's go back that. >> megyn: we gallon to the all-star panel here. britt hume and juan williams and steve hayes. >> and one other thing in the exit polling in ohio tonight. 5% of the vote in the exit poling came from democrats, rick santorum carried them by 22 points. mitt romney, it appears won the republican vote in ohio by six percentage point, which means that if this comes down to a single percentage point twon't be unfair to say that democrats put rick santorum over the top in ohio. >> megyn: mischief? >> well, we don't know. we don't know the motivation. maybe it's his great blue-collar appeal, charmed by his message n. michigan, we know an effort was made to get the democrats to vote to beat mitt romney, which is -- you know, to keep this

race going and i think, you know, we can assume that some of this vote would be mischief. but it's an interesting fact. and what could be the decisive factor in this race? interesting. >> bret: by the way, more with the panel after a quick break. we have word from the santorum campaign, the senior staff there in ohio, they near a holding room, right now and say, former senator rick santorum may come out and talk to the cameras. don't pull your head on cameras, we are being told. they are feeling confident as ohio is too close to call. more with the panel. some analysis as we wait for ohio, the swing of swing states. stay with us.

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>> welcome back. we want to get back to our all-star panel. what are your thoughts so far? >> li mean, i think what happens in ohio is really huge. if santorum wins there, then i think it's going to be a setback for romney. i'm surprised because i think that things were tightening up and it looked like the momentum wasn't really behind santorum t. seemed that he didn't have the wind in his back necessarily. so, yeah, this race seems like something that's going to go on and on and on? do you think it matters at this point, as close as it is who, wins? >> i think that -- for romney's purposes, he really -- he needs to win. he is the -- he is considered the frontrunner, but he's having

trouble being the frontrunner. look, i don't bee that you have to win ohio to win in the general election. i don't think there is any connection. but for psychological purposes, it doesn't send the greatest message and you can see where he does struggle with voters that santorum seems to connect with, whether it is evangelical or blue collar voters and that's a concern for him. >> bret: but when come down to the delegate hunting, mitt romney, potentially, no matter what will have a good night delegatewise. >> true. >> bret: second in tennessee and it's probably a good night. yet fhe loses ohio, the headlines will probably be -- rick santorum stuns in ohio. >> yeah. publicexactly. it feels like iowa all over again. you can make the argument that we have made throughout this process that organization doesn't matter as much as everybody thinks it does and organization matter ace lot.

organization matters all the time because rick santorum's going to be ineligible for 18 delegates because he wasn't on -- he didn't file a slate of delegates in time. that's a huge problem, going to britt's pointer about how delegate count is ultimately what matters, tell affect him and the way this is reported if he ekes out a win. but on the other hand, you look at exit polls out of ohio, it's the same story for mitt romney. once again, he doesn't do as well among very conservative, self-identified very conservative voters, 31% of the electorate in ohio, santorum won nearly half, 48%. romney took 31%. same with strong tea party supporters, 28% in ohio and santorum wins 4-10 and romney wins 3-10. that's the story. if mitt romney is the general election candidate, in some respects, that will be a big part of the story of the general

election fight. >> bret: juan? >> the other part, again, looking at the numbers so far out of ohio is religion. if you ask people how important is it that the candidate you voted for share jure belief, what you see in ohio, georgia, tennessee and even virginia, that you see that that is where santorum has a marked advantage. now, i want to get back to the speeches that we watched tonight. when you watch rick santorum speak and have his grandmother by his side -- >> bret: his mother. >> his mother. it wasn't just a matter of being nice, i think that was a real sign about the fact that right now, he is split -- men with romney in ohio. he lost among women. if he was able to capture women that, would really have, i think, given him a clear margin by this. and similarly, when we watched mitt romney in his speech, i noticed tonight, he really spoke to the blue-collar votener a

very significant way, saying we will not forget you, we will not leave you behind. he spoke to their economic issues, says he understands what it's like to work two jobs, understands what it's like to strug toll pay bills. i hadn't heard that from mitt romney before. again, as steve was pointing out, those blue-collar voters, right now are not coming to mitt romney. i thought he turned a corner, i thought he sustained things in michigan. now it looks as though he can't sustain it with very conservative, tea party voters and the blue-collar vote. >> megyn: rick, quickly? >> the margin now -- and it ought to be on the screen, i would think, is down to something like, barely 3,000 votes, if that, ohio -- so, it's just tightening -- >> bret: romney folks are saying they are confident, pointing to hamilton, cuyahoga, franklin. they insist, quote, santorum cannot copy up in ohio.

almost 90% of the votes in. and as you can see, too close to call. charles krauthammer coming up and john bolton, straight ahead. back in 3 minutes. stay here on america's election headquarters. i love that my daughter's part fish.

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