RICHARDSON, Texas – Returning to what has become a familiar theme, Newt Gingrich on Monday suggested that Fox News is excessively running ads supporting Mitt Romney as a way to seal the nomination for the GOP presidential front-runner.
Asked during a town hall at Pappasito’s Restaurant here whether Fox has helped or hurt Gingrich’s own bid for president, the former House speaker implied foul play by the news network where he was formerly a contributor and which he lambasted last week in a private meeting. He has made media-bashing one of the main focuses of his race.
“I think all you have to do is go look at the studies of how often they’ve repeated the Romney ads—just start right there,” Gingrich answered. “Everybody here understands where the elite media is coming from. The elite media across the board would like this race to be Romney versus [President] Obama, and they’ve been biased that way for virtually the whole race.”
Gingrich’s public stop came amid a fundraising swing through the Lone Star State, which will hold its primary May 29. Billing himself as the “last conservative standing”—and name-dropping Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who endorsed him in January—Gingrich was met at the front of the room with shouts from audience members declaring, “It’s not over yet!”
Gingrich nodded. “Anybody that thought it was over,” he replied, “in Colorado this weekend, it was 13 delegates for Romney and 23 delegates not for Romney. So that didn’t strike me as making it very inevitable, frankly.”
He added that more than 6,000 people have donated to his campaign at Newt.org since Rick Santorum’s departure from the race last week.
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