Ron Paul’s base of supporters handed him a national straw poll win at the Values Voter Summit in Washington today.
Paul gave a long and faith-focused speech before a sizeable crowd here Saturday morning. A large number of his supporters wandered the halls during VVS, and gave him some serious love after his speech. And apparently some serious votes too.
After the poll results were announced, Tony Perkins — head of the Family Research Council, which sponsors VVS — downplayed Paul’s win, saying 600 people signed up for VVS today and many of them left after the straw poll balloting was over. A total 1,983 votes were cast in the straw poll balloting.
Rick Perry and Mitt Romney, who were the focus of the coverage at VVS thanks to Perry’s controversial new endorser Robert Jeffress and a debate about Mormonism among some of the speakers gathered here, fared poorly in the poll.
Perkins said Romney has work to do to make his case to evangelical voters, but he said he agreed with Romney’s “call for civility” following some talk about Mormonism from the podium at VVS.
Michele Bachmann, who was the only candidate to directly stump for straw poll votes in her speech from the podium at VVS, also failed to impress with her vote totals.
Jon Huntsman, who didn’t show up here — and is not a social conservative favorite in any case — did the worst, earning a big fat 0% of the votes cast.
Full results of VVS Presidential Straw Poll:
Ron Paul: 37%
Herman Cain: 23%
Rick Santorum: 16%
Rick Perry: 8%
Michele Bachmann: 8%
Mitt Romney: 4%
Newt Gingrich: 3%
Jon Huntsman: 0%
Undecided: 1%
VVS Vice Presidential Straw Poll top results:
Michele Bachmann
Herman Cain
Marco Rubio
Rick Santorum
This post has been updated to include comments from Tony Perkins after the straw poll results were announced.
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