BATON ROUGE, La. – Newt Gingrich spoke up in defense of Mitt Romney Thursday night, insisting any Republican presidential candidate would be a better president than Barack Obama.

"I want to start with something Rick said tonight that I frankly was very surprised that he said and that I hope he's taking back,” Gingrich told the Baton Rouge Tea Party event crowd referring to Rick Santorum’s comments earlier today.

Santorum, addressing a crowd in San Antonio, Texas this afternoon took a swipe at Romney, saying, "If you’re going to be a little different, we might as well stay with what we have instead of taking a risk with what may be the Etch A Sketch candidate of the future.”

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But Gingrich argued that re-electing Obama would be a “disaster” and Republicans have an obligation to do better.

Speaking on the campus of Louisiana State University, the former House Speaker told the few hundred person crowd they have no choice.

“I may have some very substantial disagreements with Gov. Romney. There is no doubt in my mind that if the choice was Gov. Romney or Barack Obama, we would have no choice,” Gingrich said. “The danger of Obama is so great that I would hope that every candidate running – Ron Paul, Gov. Romney and Sen. Santorum – that we would all agree that whoever becomes the Republican nominee, we have one common goal and that is to defeat Barack Obama."

While Gingrich finds faults with his GOP rivals, he has told crowds throughout his campaign that any of the other candidates are superior to the current president.

In closing his speech tonight, Gingrich laid out why he believes he is still the best candidate to take on Obama in the fall.

“Getting Washington to change in fundamental ways is going to be very, very hard.  You had better have somebody who wakes up every single morning prepared to fight. Because if you don’t have somebody who knows what they’re doing and has the willpower and the energy and the focus to do it, they’re going to make nice speeches and fail,” Gingrich said, noting that winning the Louisiana primary on Saturday would help reset this race once again.

Less than a week before Tuesday’s crucial Republican presidential primary in Michigan, a new NBC News/Marist poll shows Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum locked in a statistical tie, while a separate NBC/Marist survey shows Romney comfortably leading in Arizona, which holds its primary the same day.

In Michigan – which has turned into a make-or-break contest for Romney – the former Massachusetts governor gets the support of 37 percent of likely GOP primary voters, including those who are leaning toward a particular candidate.

NBC-Marist poll results: Michigan | Arizona

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Santorum, the former Pennsylvania senator, gets 35 percent, and he’s followed by Texas Rep. Ron Paul at 13 percent and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich at 8 percent.

NYT: GOP campaigns grow more dependent on 'super PAC' aid

“Michigan is neck and neck,” says pollster Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion, which conducted both surveys.

But in Arizona, Romney is on safer ground: He receives the support of 43 percent of likely GOP primary voters, Santorum gets 27 percent, Gingrich 16 percent and Paul 11 percent.

And looking ahead to November’s general election, President Barack Obama enjoys a double-digit edge over his closest GOP competition in Michigan (a state Republicans are hoping to target), while he’s trailing the leading Republicans in Arizona (which the Obama camp wants to put into play). 

Romney vs. Santorum ideological breakdown
In both states, support for Romney and Santorum breaks down along ideological lines, as well as whether voters have already cast their ballots.

In Michigan, Santorum leads Romney among self-identified Tea Party supporters, 48 to 29 percent, and those who describe themselves as “very conservative,” 59 to 20 percent.

Michigan voters: Santorum connects better than Romney

Yet among those who don’t support the Tea Party, Romney is ahead by more than 20 points, 45 to 24 percent.

And among those who have already voted absentee in Michigan – 16 percent of likely GOP voters – Romney leads Santorum, 49 to 26 percent.

NYT: After auto industry bailout, Detroit fallout trails Romney

The same ideological pattern is true in Arizona, although Romney performs much better with the most conservative voters there than in Michigan. 

And among those who have voted early or absentee in Arizona – more than half of all likely Republicans voters in the poll – Romney holds a 30-point advantage over Santorum, 52 to 22 percent.

Obama leads in Michigan, trails in Arizona
Turning to the general-election race in November, Obama leads Romney in Michigan by nearly 20 points among registered voters, 51 to 33 percent, with 15 percent undecided.

Against Paul, the president’s lead is 22 points (53 to 31 percent); against Santorum, it’s 26 points (55 to 29 percent); and against Gingrich, it’s 28 points (56 to 28 percent).

What’s more, 51 percent of registered Michigan voters approve of Obama’s job; 63 percent of them believe the auto industry bailout was a good idea (including 61 percent of independents and 42 percent of likely GOP primary voters); and a majority think the president deserves credit for the auto industry’s recovery.

But Arizona is tougher territory for the president, whose approval rating among registered voters in the state is just 38 percent.

NYT: Obama offers to cut corporate tax rate to 28%

In hypothetical match-ups, Obama trails Romney by five points (40 to 45 percent); Santorum by three (42 to 45 percent); Paul by 2 points (41 to 43 percent); yet he leads Gingrich by five (45 to 40 percent).

The NBC/Marist survey of Michigan was conducted Feb. 19-20 of 3,149 registered voters (margin of error of plus-minus 1.8 percentage points) and 715 likely Republican primary voters (plus-minus 3.7 percentage points).

The NBC/Marist survey of Arizona also was conducted Feb. 19-20 of 2,487 registered voters (plus-minus 2.0 percentage points) and 767 likely GOP primary voters (plus-minus 3.5 percentage points).

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. – In back-to-back appearances before two separate audiences under the same roof here tonight, Mitt Romney made part of his Michigan strategy clear: Pick a fight with "big labor" by labeling their support of President Barack Obama as "crony capitalism."

To a group of business leaders who had gathered for a roundtable discussion, Romney said that Obama’s bailouts of Chrysler and General Motors were designed to "foster the interests of organized labor."

"The President finally came around to my own view that Detroit needed to go through managed bankruptcy,” Romney said. “But he gave the companies to the UAW (United Auto Workers) when he was finished with the process. That again is something which I think is consistent with the fact that he got a lot of money from organized labor and felt that he should give them a favor."

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Romney repeated his attack on Obama and the auto workers union during a rally that followed the roundtable. He vowed to limit the power of "union bosses."

"He got hundreds of millions of dollars from labor bosses for his campaign, and so he's paying them back in every way he knows how,” Romney said. "I've taken on union bosses before, and I'm happy to take them on again."

While Romney has said he does not oppose all unions (he often cites the carpenters' union as an example of one he likes), the strategy of taking on labor unions is not without risk in Michigan, where 12 percent of the state's workforce belongs to a union, according to government records.

Building on a theme, Romney's campaign announced a conference call entitled “Rick Santorum's Defense of Big Labor and Big Spending."

Romney balanced his attacks on labor with cheery anecdotes about his upbringing in Michigan.

"I visited every county in Michigan, I think more than once, on my dad's campaign and my mom's campaign," Romney reminisced onstage at the rally. "I've gone to the country fairs. So I didn't always see the best of each county but I saw every county in this extraordinarily beautiful state. I love Michigan."

NBC ad tracking sources show the personal may also be political – Romney’s campaign has put $1.2 million toward advertising in Michigan – more than the deep-pocketed pro-Romney super PAC Restore our Future has spent here to date. His first television ad in the state touts his childhood in the Wolverine State.

Tomorrow, Romney will accept the endorsement of the state's Republican governor, Rick Snyder, campaign and GOP sources tell NBC News. Snyder, a former businessman who calls himself "one tough nerd," will appear alongside Romney at a midday event in Farmington Hills.

GREELEY, Colo. - As his plane touched down in Denver, Colo. on Saturday afternoon, presidential hopeful Rick Santorum peeked up from his iPad to announce the first results he had seen come out of Nevada. “We’re tied with Romney in Searchlight, Nevada. That may be the highlight of our day,”  Santorum joked to the handful of reporters following him throughout the state.  "You guys are going to tweet that, aren't you?"

While most of the political world was focused on the Silver State's caucus, the former Pennsylvania senator headed east for three stops in Colorado.  He remained upbeat and largely dismissive of any impact the results would have on his candidacy -- even as it became clear he would finish last, something he has been able to avoid in all previous primaries and caucuses.

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"It's a state that very much favors Gov. Romney," Santorum said of Nevada.  "He's invested about $1 million in the state already.  Ron Paul's got close to $1 million in the state.  We just don't have those resources. We think we'll do well in some of the conservative areas...Las Vegas doesn't match up for me as well as some other states do. We're not putting an emphasis on it."

 

Santorum's absence from Nevada on Saturday marks the second straight time when the candidate was not in the state that was voting.  When Florida voters went to the polls last Tuesday, the GOP hopeful was in Nevada and arguing the Sunshine State's results show nothing more than the fact that candidates with the most money do well in the state's that are most expensive.

Since his Iowa caucus victory, Santorum has struggled to remain relevant.  With each state he has lost, the excuses have built. Romney took New Hampshire because he hailed from a neighboring state, and Newt Gingrich won South Carolina for the same reason, he argues.

Political observers point to his ailing poll numbers and comparatively low war chest as evidence Santorum's campaign is on its last legs.

But the Santorum campaign remains undeterred by the conventional thinking that their candidate needs wins that translate into momentum and money is irrelevant.  They have more money now than at any point during their run.  And while reports have indicated Newt Gingrich is losing support from some of his big money backers, Santorum to this point has not had that issue.

 The commitment does not seem to be waning from Foster Friess, the billionaire largely funding the pro-Santorum Super PAC "Red, White, and Blue Fund."  Friess has recently been with Santorum, traveling with him to each of his three stops and illustrating the blurry laws that say candidates are not allowed to collaborate with Super PACs.

"We don't talk about any activity of the Super PAC at all," said Santorum. "I have no idea about what he's doing or how much he's giving and I don't want to know. We talk about family. We talk about other activities. He's very careful in that regard and so am I."

Outside of Friess' influence, Santorum has been able to continue to translate their Iowa victory into dollars, though still underfunded compared to the campaign coffers of the three other Republicans still in the race.  Santorum has made the comment in the past that the only reason candidates stop running for president is because they run out of money.  Campaign aides say they are stretching dollars as far as possible to ensure that doesn't happen soon.

Another sign that the Pennsylvanian has no plans to leave the race are the debut of newer and sharper hits on his GOP rivals.  "Newt can throw out some funny lines about people going to jail, but he supported the basic concepts of Dodd-Frank.  And you don't think the President's going to point that out?  You don't think the President is going to point out what their position is on health care, which is identical to his?" Santorum asked while campaigning in Montrose, Colo.

"I heard Mitt Romney say the other day that he doesn't care that he doesnt care about the very poor.  He doesn't care about the very rich or the very poor, that his program's going to focus on the 95%," Santorum said. "I thought, that's not the Republican party I believe in. That's not the conservative movement I believe in.  We need a President who believe in 95%, or 99% like this president.  We need a President that's concerned with 100% of Americans."

Santorum now heads to Minnesota for a day of campaigning and will be back in Colorado Monday night. 

LUVERNE, MN -- Those thinking Rick Santorum would never be able to recapture what his campaign had in the Hawkeye State were wrong, at least for a night, when the Iowa caucus victor made a stop here in a town just ten miles north of the state that catapulted his candidacy.

Santorum held his first campaign event in a part of Minnesota just north of Lyon County Iowa, the northwest most part of Iowa with a large contingent of evangelical voters and an area where caucus returns were overwhelmingly in his favor.

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Even the originally scheduled venue, a Pizza Ranch restaurant , was reminiscent of his Iowa campaign.  He held more than 30 town halls at the restaurants located throughout the state.  Monday's town hall ended up being moved to a theater next door to accommodate the 300 person crowd, though he stopped by after to grab a bite.

"I figured, lets start bordering Lyon County as a point of strength...and make this the focal point, the starting point, for our campaign across Minnesota," said Santorum.

It was the former Pennsylvania senators first day back on the trail since his 3-year-old daughter was admitted to a Virginia hospital after developing pneumonia in both lungs.  Bella Santorum suffers from the genetic disorder Trisomy 18 and has battled the life threatening illness all of her life.  She is still in the hospital but has shown major improvements.

"I was with her last night in the hospital bed, laid with her and slept with her last night," said Santorum.  "She woke up this morning and had a big smile on her face and I thought, 'OK, dad can go back to work now.'"

He canceled campaign events in Florida on Sunday, and chose to continue his campaign with a stop in Missouri on Monday before heading to Minnesota.  He will watch Florida returns in from his Nevada headquarters.

"I don't know what's going to happen in Florida tomorrow, but it's only one race," he said. "Everyone says, 'Oh it's over then.'  It will not be. This race is going to go on a long time, and it needs to go on a long time."

Attempting to win over voters ahead of the Minnesota's Feb. 7 caucus, Santorum painted himself as the true social conservative in the race.

He talked about protecting anti-abortion rights and the importance of family -- points that have played less of a role in his stump speech since leaving Iowa.  Abandoning Florida the day before the primary shows he is focusing outside the expensive where he struggled to compete with his better funded GOP rivals and where recent polls have him a distant third.

"This is one of those races that we shouldn't make rash decisions just because someone has the most money.  Let me assure you, no matter how much more money Gov. Romney has than either Newt or I have, he's not going to have near the money President Obama's going to have.  So if you think that we're going to win this race because Gov. Romney will have more money to beat up Barack Obama, then Barack Obama will have to beat him up, you're wrong," said Santorum. "Having the most money isnt going to win this race.  having the best candidate with the best ideas"

It is caucus states like Minnesota, Colorado and Nevada were the presidential hopeful is now focusing in the hopes of being able to pick up delegates without having to outright win a state.  His message is that the baggage and records of his competitors will be a distraction in a head-to-head matchup with President Obama.

The general election "can't be about someone who is an undisciplined politician who is coming up with a new idea every ten seconds, most of which don't make any sense. Or someone who is a recent conservative in order to be able to win an election as is in both of their cases, on the major issues of the day,"

the GOP hopeful told the crowd.  Santorum has previously taken swipes at former Speaker Newt Gingrich for proposing a permanent U.S. base on the moon, Mitt Romney for never having won an election while running as a conservative.

The Santorum campaign will split time between Colorado and Nevada over the early part of this week.

PHILADELPHIA, PA - Speaking from the hospital room where he said his ailing 3-year-old daughter is making a "miraculous turnaround," Rick Santorum said that he would resume his campaign on Monday with stops in western caucus states.

"She went through a very tough time the last 48 hours and this afternoon she made really a remarkable turn," Santorum told voters in Florida and Minnesota, via two tele-town halls Sunday night, of his daughter Isabella, who was rushed to the hospital the night before after developing pneumonia in both lungs.

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Santorum said that Isabella, who also suffers from the genetic disorder Trisomy 18, was still in the intensive care unit and was not ready to be released home, but that doctors were encouraged by the improvements made over the past few hours.

 

"We've still got a long way to go here but she has without a doubt turned the corner and we are very, very grateful," he said.

Santorum had cleared his Sunday schedule in Florida to be with his daughter but will be back on the trail tomorrow afternoon with stops over the next two days in Missouri, Minnesota, Colorado and Nevada, all caucus states. He will not be back in Florida before its election on Tuesday, having cancelled an event in Boca Raton scheduled for that morning.

Instead, Santorum will hold a primary night party in Las Vegas, an indication the campaign has pulled its stakes from the Sunshine State where a recent NBC/Marist poll had Santorum in a very distant third place.

In fact, turnout at a Sunday afternoon event in Sarasota - at which Santorum's daughter Elizabeth filled in for her dad - served as an indicator to the campaign as to whether they would continue to stump in the state through Tuesday's primary. The rally, held in the same venue where Newt Gingrich drew more than 3,000 people, had a scant showing of fewer than 250.

Santorum also seemed to have already moved beyond Florida during the call with Minnesota voters in which he emphasized the importance of caucus-style contests to his campaign.

"We want the activists of the party, the people who make up the vast part of the Republican Party, to have a say in who our nominee is as opposed to a bunch of people who don't even identify themselves as Republicans picking our nominee," Santorum said, noting that only registered Republicans can participate in a caucus.

"I believe that a state should only allow Republicans to vote in a Republican primary. Why? Because it's the Republican nomination, not the independent nomination or the Democratic nomination."

Santorum refrained from making such a pro-caucus statement in Florida, which holds a primary, albeit a closed one in which only Republicans can vote.

"This is an election that's wide open; This race isn't going to be decided in Florida, it's not going to be decided for quite some time. But Florida can have a big say," he said to voters on the first call.

And while he didn't handicap his finish in Tuesday's primary, Santorum still predicted he would finish strong in the Sunshine State, thanks to an increase in donations which he said began after his victory in the Iowa caucus was confirmed.

"We're going to come out of Florida I think with a pretty good number, certainly dollars per votes we're going to run rings around the other candidates," Santorum said, referring to the amount of money candidates spend in a state divided by the vote percentage they receive.

A decent showing in Florida will allow him, he continued, to "come into states like Minnesota, Colorado and some of the other states that are having their caucuses and primaries and be in a much better position."

Santorum said he was hoping to "do very well" in Minnesota, adding "we're looking forward to getting up there tomorrow and spending a lot of time and trying to get folks in the Land of Ten Thousand Lakes to join us."

The consulting firm founded by Newt Gingrich on Monday night released a copy of its 2006 contract with Freddie Mac showing it was paid $300,000 to provide unspecified "consulting and related services" for one of the federally sponsored housing agency's top lobbyists.

The contract between the Center for Health Transformation, an arm of the Gingrich Group, and Freddie Mac shows that Gingrich reported directly to  to Craig Thomas, who at the time served as the agency’s director of public policy and was one of its registered lobbyists on Capitol Hill. 

But a spokeswoman for the firm said it was unable to find an earlier contract dating to 1999 and renewed until 2002. The spokeswoman, Susan Meyers, also could not say whether Gingrich or any of its employees produced any written reports for Freddie Mac as part of the nearly $1.8 million in consulting fees it was paid.  

"I have no idea if there were any written reports," she said. "This is all we are authorized to release."

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The 15-page contract, signed with a Gingrich Group executive, sheds little light on what Gingrich actually did for Freddie Mac -- a question that has become an issue in the presidential campaign. It states only that the Gingrich Group will that provide unspecified consulting services for Thomas.

One of the provisions states that consulting "will provide status reports" to Freddie Mac on its work and supply it with copies "of any disclosures or reports it may be required to file by law, such as reports filed under the Lobbying Disclosure Act."

Gingrich, who originally said he provided advice "as a historian," has adamantly denied he did any lobbying for Freddie Mac, an assertion repeated by Nancy Desmond, the CEO of the Center for Health Transformation.

“As noted under the scope of work section on Page 14, the contract was solely for consulting purposes and not lobbying," she said in a statement posted along with the contract on the group's website.

According to Meyers, the firm originally signed a contract with Freddie Mac in late 1999 for the same  $25,000 a month, which  was renewed until 2002. The firm was unable to locate that document and the renewals, she said. After lapsing, the Freddie Mac consulting agreement was signed again in 2006 and was renewed in 2007.

All Freddie Mac reports are now controlled by the Federal Housing Finance Agency. The agency did not respond to requests for comment Monday. It recently rejected a Freedom of Information Act request filed by Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group, for any and all records that Freddie Mac may have had on the Gingrich Group, stating in a Dec. 6, 2011 letter: "A search of FHFA records located no documents responsive to your request."

CHARLESTON, S.C. – As Rick Santorum’s supporters celebrated his strong Iowa showing, they were also making preparations for a push through South Carolina that will begin even before the New Hampshire primary vote.

Santorum’s South Carolina fans, some of whom were gathered at his relatively well-appointed campaign headquarters to watch the caucus returns, will be able to see him in the Palmetto State on the afternoon of Sunday, Jan. 8th, when he stops in Greenville just two days before the New Hampshire vote.

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His campaign also added another South Carolina staffer: political consultant Andrew Boucher, a former executive director of the New Hampshire Republican primary – a ramping-up of staff that suggests Santorum will seek to capitalize on his Iowa momentum here, a state that has picked every Republican presidential candidate since 1980.

Recommended: 11 things you might not now about Santorum

Santorum’s supporters, about 15 of whom remained at the headquarters as the final votes trickled in, were ecstatic about his neck-and-neck finish with Mitt Romney – but some of them said they weren’t surprised he did so well.

“I knew this was going to happen,” Kathy Hughes, a retired teacher from Mt. Pleasant, said. “So many people were saying, ‘why are you supporting him? Santorum can’t win!’ But I knew.”

She added that the phones at Santorum’s headquarters here had been ringing non-stop over the past few days. The phone did buzz a few times into the wee hours of Wednesday morning; the last call, Hughes said, came from a voter in Peoria, Illinois who was trying to get in touch with one of Santorum’s early-state headquarters.

• STORY: Romney edges past Santorum in Iowa photo finish

Joan Peters, a member of the Charleston Tea Party board from Moncks Corner, said she supported Santorum’s decision not to skip New Hampshire and come directly to South Carolina as Michele Bachmann is doing and Rick Perry was going to do before he announced he’d first return to Austin to reassess his campaign.

“He’s probably not going to win because Mitt Romney’s got New Hampshire pretty sewn up, but he’ll do well and then he’ll come down to South Carolina and the money’s going to start coming in,” Peters said. “People now realize what we’ve always realized, which is that he’s a credible candidate and he can win.”

More on NBC Politics: 

Three major storylines from the entrance polls

Perry to 'reassess' campaign

NBC's Andrew Rafferty: Much has changed for Santorum