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28 March 2024

Romney wins Maryland, looks to sweep 3 primaries

Published
By AP

Mitt Romney tightened his grip on the Republican presidential nomination Tuesday night, winning primaries in Maryland and Washington, DC, and taking the lead in Wisconsin, andurged his party to shift focus to the general election showdown with President Barack Obama.

The victories enabled Romney to pad his already considerable delegate lead over Republican rival Rick Santorum, who is under growing pressure to abandon his own candidacy in the name of party unity.

"The right thing for us, I think, is to get a nominee as soon as we can and be able to focus on Barack Obama,'' the former Massachusetts governor said in an interview Tuesday with Fox News.

Despite the setbacks, Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, told supporters in his home state that he does not intend to quit the race. He vowed to keep battling until Romney is assured of the 1,144 delegates needed to secure the nomination at the party's national convention in late August in Tampa, Florida.

Maryland returns showed Romney gaining 50 per cent of the vote, compared with 29 percent for Santorum, 11 percent for Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the House of Representatives, and 9 per cent for Texas Rep. Ron Paul.

In Wisconsin, with 4 per cent of the vote counted, Romney had 42 per cent to 39 per cent for Santorum, 11 percent for Paul and 6 per cent for Gingrich. With 14 per cent of precincts counted in Washington, Romney had 68 per cent of the vote to 15 per cent for Paul and 12 per cent for Gingrich. Santorum was not on the ballot. Romney and Obama exchanged barbs Tuesday in further acknowledgement that both camps think the fall campaign for the general election has already begun.

Romney, who has cemented his lead over Santorum through overwhelming spending on television advertising, will face a better organized, better financed Obama campaign backed by the power of the presidency.

"He gets full credit or blame for what's happened in this economy, and what's happened to gasoline prices under his watch, and what's happened to our schools, and what's happened to our military forces,'' Romney told supporters gathered at a sandwich shop in Waukesha, Wisconsin. ``All these things are his responsibility while he's president."

Obama said things could be worse - and predicted they would be if Romney and Republicans got their way. He criticised Romney for supporting the budget plan introduced by Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, the influential chairman of the House Budget Committee.

In a speech to the annual meeting of The Associated Press, Obama said the House-passed budget supported by Republicans was "antithetical  to our entire history as a land of opportunity and upward mobility or everybody who's willing to work for it ... It is a prescription for decline.''

Obama's re-election campaign is running a new TV ad in six swing states criticizing the former Romney by name for the first time - in this case as a backer of "Big Oil.'' Rising petrol prices are shaping up to be a major campaign issue and the Republicans are trying to blame that on Obama.
Romney responded Tuesday by accusing the president of trying to shift blame for the bad economy.

"The president put an ad out yesterday, talking about petrol prices and how high they are. And guess who he blamed? Me!''

Romney said after handing out ham, turkey and Italian sandwiches to supporters. "Maybe after I'm president I can take responsibility for things I might have done wrong. But this president doesn't want to take responsibility for his mistakes.''

For Romney, the end of the contested primary campaign could hardly come soon enough. Obama has gained in the polls in recent months, particularly among women, as Republicans vie among themselves for support from the party's increasingly conservative base. Santorum has devoted more time to social issues - including birth control - than Romney, who has  generally stayed focused on economic issues.