SARASOTA, Fla. -- About 2,500 flag-waving fans greeted Newt Gingrich in an airplane hangar for the biggest rally of his presidential campaign thus far, but not all were friendly.
U.S. Rep. Connie Mack, R-Fla., a supporter of Gingrich’s chief rival for the Republican nomination, Mitt Romney, held court with reporters on the periphery of the crowd. He was there to press the Romney campaign's attack of the day -- Gingrich's consulting work on behalf of government-backed mortgage lender Freddie Mac, a key conservative villain in the housing crisis.
As Gingrich made his way down Florida’s Gulf Coast on Tuesday, he exuded confidence, telling the Sarasota throng: "If we win the primary next Tuesday, I believe I will be the nominee."
All the while, the Freddie Mac issue nagged at his heels, a potentially powerful attack in this foreclosure-heavy state.
Romney pressed the offensive in Monday night’s debate, after Gingrich released a $300,000 contract with the company from 2006.
Gingrich’s former company, the Center for Health Transformation, also was set to release more contracts with Freddie Mac on Tuesday night. Gingrich’s consulting work for Freddie Mac stretched back to 1999.
Gingrich said he never lobbied for Freddie Mac, and he never registered as a lobbyist.
But in his consulting role, he became a public cheerleader for Freddie Mac and government-sponsored mortgage enterprises, which he said at the time were worthwhile. In a 2007 interview posted on Freddie Mac’s website -- which has since been removed -- Gingrich said, “The housing GSEs have made an important contribution to homeownership and the housing finance system.” He added that the space program and health care could be ripe for a government-sponsored enterprise.
Gingrich now says he was advising Freddie Mac not to buy risky mortgage-backed securities. When the housing market collapsed, those investments went bad, and Freddie -- along with fellow government-sponsored enterprise Fannie Mae -- received a federal bailout.
"I think he's got a lot of explaining to do," Mack said. "And what I would say is the people in the state of Florida who have had their homes devalued or lost their homes, they want to know what the relationship was, and I think they deserve that answer."
The Romney campaign is also invoking Freddie Mac on television. “While Florida families lost everything in the housing crisis, Newt Gingrich cashed in,” the ad’s narrator says.
Romney is better funded and able to spend big on Florida’s 10 pricey media markets. But since his big victory Saturday in South Carolina, Gingrich has raised more than $2 million. Polls also show him surging here.
But the Romney camp hopes to sway voters like Linda Bay, 62, of Venice, Fla., who attended the Sarasota rally. The tea party movement supporter said she appreciated Gingrich’s pugnacious debating style, but he might not get her vote next Tuesday because of his Freddie Mac associations.
"That bothers me," she said.
At a late-afternoon rally in Fort Myers, 50-year-old Ed Roock said he was undecided on next Tuesday’s vote and concerned about Gingrich’s “baggage” -- but the Freddie Mac work “doesn’t bother me so much.”
“I don’t care that he got paid,” Roock said. “I’m glad he got a conservative message to them.”
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