Mitt Romney won the pivotal Republican primary in Florida, defeating Newt Gingrich. With his win in Tuesday's primary, Romney has recovered the political momentum he had lost after Gingrich's victory in the Jan. 21 South Carolina primary. Florida was by far the largest of the first four nominating contests, according to a report of the Associated Press. Romney won almost half the votes in a four-person race in Florida. Returns from 100 percent of Florida's precincts showed Romney with 46 percent of the vote to 32 percent for Gingrich. Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum had 13 percent, and Texas congressman Ron Paul 7 percent. The winner-take-all primary was worth 50 delegates to the Republican National Convention in late August in Tampa, Florida. That gave Romney a total of 87, to 26 for Gingrich, 14 for Santorum and four for Paul, with 1,144 required to clinch the nomination.
