A key supporter of Mike Huckabee’s 2008 presidential campaign in South Carolina said today that he will back Jon Huntsman for the Republican presidential nomination if the former Utah governor and ex-ambassador to China enters the race, according to several sources.
Mike Campbell, the son of the late Gov. Carroll Campbell and whose mother served as honorary chair of Huckabee‘s 2008 presidential campaign in South Carolina, told reporters that he was impressed with the former Utah governor after meeting him earlier this year.
“As governor of Utah, Jon Huntsman demonstrated he is the type of problem-solver our country needs. He’s a proven conservative who cut taxes, grew jobs, passed free-market health care reform, and signed strong pro-life legislation,” Campbell said in a statement.
Campbell, who ran unsuccessfully for the Republican nomination for lieutenant governor in 2006 — falling short in a runoff against incumbent Andre Bauer — served as a senior advisor to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s 2008 presidential campaign in the Palmetto State. Huckabee finished a close second to eventual GOP nominee John McCain in that primary, losing to McCain by fewer than 15,000 votes.
South Carolina has accurately chosen the winner of the GOP presidential nomination in every primary since 1980, when former California governor Ronald Reagan cruised past John B. Connally with 55 percent of the vote and went on to win the party’s nomination.
Campbell is the first member of Huckabee’s organization in South Carolina to publicly align himself with another candidate since the former Arkansas governor’s announcement on Saturday that he won’t be a candidate in 2012.
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