A South Carolina win could cement Mitt Romney as the Republican nominee, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich told MSNBC’s Chuck Todd in an interview broadcast on Wednesday.
"If Romney can win South Carolina, he's probably going to be the nominee. This is his big test," Gingrich said of his rival for the Republican presidential nomination. "He has so much money that if he also has the advantage of momentum, it's going to be very hard to stop him," Gingrich said of Romney.
Gingrich also defended his criticism of Romney’s career at Bain Capital, saying that his critique does not imply a critique of capitalism.
"Criticizing one businessman for one set of practices is not an assault on capitalism. I am totally for free enterprise, I'm totally for capitalism,” Gingrich said. He added, “ I'm not saying anything Romney's done was outside of the law, I'm saying it may have been bad judgment, it may have been an exploitation.”
Gingrich aligned himself with the Tea Party, saying that the Tea Party “believes the big institutions are dangerous, whether they're big banks, big government, or big labor because they inherently conflict with the model of American freedom.”
"I find powerful rich people rigging games very distasteful," he said.
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