(via)Mitt Romney was announced from the podium Saturday afternoon as the winner of the Family Research Council’s "Values Voter Straw Poll" of Christian conservatives, but it turns out that Huck-mentum was in the air.
The 5,775-vote total included thousands of people who had voted online, and might have become eligible by paying as little as $1 to join FRC Action, the legislative action arm of the Family Research Council.
Although the audience of evangelicals at the Washington Hilton was not told about the alternate count, the crowd favorite by a mile among the 952 attendees who voted in person was former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee. He took 51 percent of the in-person votes, compared to just 10 percent for the former Massachusetts governor.Organizers said they wound up with more than 2,200 attendees, plus more than 400 journalists. Further complicating the voting totals, about 600 attendees voted online, so making it tougher to generalize about the discrepancies, organizers said.
[...]
The two groups of voters agreed on one thing: Hillary Clinton was voted “least acceptable” candidate both overall (4,141 votes, or 72 percent) and in online voting (733 votes, or 77 percent). In total voting, Giuliani was the runner-up as least-acceptable, ahead of all the Democrats on the ballot. Online, that honor went to Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.)
[...]
Mike Huckabee – 488 votes – 51.26%
Mitt Romney – 99 votes – 10.40%
Fred Thompson – 77 votes – 8.09%
Tom Tancredo – 65 votes – 6.83%
Rudy Giuliani – 60 votes – 6.30%
Duncan Hunter – 54 votes – 5.67%
John McCain – 30 votes – 3.15%
Sam Brownback – 26 votes – 2.73%
Ron Paul – 25 votes – 2.63%
Undecided – 11 votes – 1.16%
So, now that he's got their vote will they open their wallets? Are conservative Christians ready to support the guy they think best represents their values? It will be interesting to see what kind of bump he gets from this.
