Stakes Are High for Gingrich Visit to Suwanee

It's not just about Gwinnett County when Newt Gingrich visits Suwanee on Saturday morning. His entire presidential campaign may be at stake.

The former U.S. House Speaker from Georgia is in third place in polls and delegate counts as he prepares for a visit to Collins Hill High at 11:30 a.m. If Gingrich wins Georgia on March 6, he would appear to be back in the hunt. Georgia is the biggest prize that day, with 73 delegates. That would put him over 100, where front-runner Mitt Romney is now.

But if Gingrich doesn't win Georgia ... well, apparently he's considering that possibility.

According to the respected Political Insider column in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Gingrich said in California: “Look, given this kind of a year, who knows?” Gingrich told reporters when asked if he could lose his home state in the Super Tuesday sweepstakes on March 6. “Romney could lose Michigan. Santorum could lose Pennsylvania. Who knows what’s going to happen?”

Also via Political Insider, it appears that other GOP candidates are willing to carry the fight to Gingrich in Georgia:

•  A Mitt Romney-affiliated super political action committee has doubled its investment on TV ads in Georgia, investing $393,780 from Feb. 21-27.
• The campaign for Rick Santorum is making TV-ad purchases in Arizona, which votes Feb. 28, and in Georgia, Ohio, Tennessee and Oklahoma — all Super Tuesday states — according to Santorum senior campaign adviser John Brabender and the AJC.

A candidate will need 1,144 delegates to win the GOP nomination and oppose President Obama in November.

Suwanee Patch editor Steve Burns contributed to this report.