For the second year in a row, Texas congressman Ron Paul won the Conservsative Political Action Conference’s presidential straw poll with about 30% of the vote while Mitt Romney again took second. No one else cracked double digits.
The results are as much a measure of who’s made an organized effort to win it as they are a barometer of sentiment among conservative activists. But Paul has a reminder of the excitement he ignites in his followers as he considers another run for president. And Romney, who won in 2007, 2008 and 2009, can feel good that the field doesn’t appear to have shifted much since last year.
The first choice straw poll results:
Ron Paul 30%
Mitt Romney 23%
Gary Johnson 6%
Chris Christie 6%
Newt Gingrich 5%
Tim Pawlenty 4%
Michele Bachmann 4%
Mitch Daniels 4%
Sarah Palin 3%
Herman Cain 2%
Mike Huckabee 2%
Rick Santorum 2%
John Thune 2%
Jon Huntsman 1%
Haley Barbour 1%
Other 5%
Undecided 1%
One of the things that did change was the number of respondents who said they were satisfied by the prospective Republican presidenital field. Most still did, but the majority was slimmer than last year. It’s notable that Christie, who’s sworn up and down he’s not going to make a White House bid in 2012, was at the front of the also-ran pack.