There really is a new sheriff in town or, more precisely, frontrunner in the race for the Republican presidential nomination, and he’s Texas Gov. Rick Perry who has opened a 29 percent to 17 percent lead over Mitt Romney with Republican voters, according to a new Gallup poll.
Another interesting result: Rep. Ron Paul of Texas was in third place with 13 percent, clearly placing him in the vaunted top tier. Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota was in fourth place at 10 percent.
Perry’s entry in the race and surge to the lead in Republican voter preference has hugely shaken up the contest, suggesting we could be seeing a knock-down, drag-out battle for the nomination before it’s all over.
Perry’s significant lead also suggests that Romney can longer run a GOP front-runner’s campaign, looking past his intraparty rivals and trying to look like his party’s inevitable nominee by framing the race as one between himself and President Obama.
Romney’s campaign is likely now entering a phase where he will need to persuade Republican voters that he’s more electable than Perry. That likely means Romney will need to point out Perry’s flaws, a tack that would likely see the Texas governor responding in kind.
The Gallup poll echoes an earlier Rasmussen poll which also indicated that Perry had established a double-digit lead over the former assachusetts governor.
The Gallup poll suggests that far from hurting himself with GOP voters with controversial comments in which he questioned the scientific basis for evolution and the human role in global warming, Perry is solidifying the support of Republicans and GOP-leaning independents.
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