Mike Huckabee withdrew from the race tonight after Sen. John McCain clinched key victories today.
“It’s now important that we turn our attention not to what could have been or what we wanted to have been but what now must be, and that is a united party,” Huckabee said in his concession speech.
The former Baptist pastor drew attention after his win in Iowa and surprised some with his success on Super Tuesday. He said tonight that he only had a staff of about 30 people. “No one has ever gotten this far with such limited resources,” he told a Texas rally. However, Huckabee never drew the same kind of evangelical support as President Bush, who took 78 percent of the evangelical vote in 2004.
Huckabee appealed some evangelicals who were dissatisfied with McCain. However, Brett O’Donnell, a spokesman for McCain’s campaign, told CT earlier that evangelicals will likely support the senator once he wins the nomination.
The most recent Christianity Today online poll that opened yesterday show 31 percent of CT readers supporting Huckabee, with McCain and Sen. Barack Obama tied at 26 percent.
Huckabee’s future is uncertain, but he is sometimes mentioned in lists of McCain’s possible vice presidents. The Washington Times writes that that Huckabee’s inner circle feels he could be the emerging leader who could re-establish the religious right, but his economic policies could also be too divisive.
