Rep. Steve King: Pawlenty made ‘the right political decision’

Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) said former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty made the “right political decision” by dropping out of the GOP presidential race the morning after finishing a distant third in the influential Ames straw poll.

“You feel bad for any candidate that comes to that conclusion. And I salute him for the effort that he put out here. And he made a decision that I think is the right political decision,” said Rep. King on CNN’s State of the Union.

{mosads}“I saw a lot of people with Pawlenty shirts on yesterday that were wearing Romney shirts four years ago. … The energy just wasn’t there,” he added. “Pawlenty has probably drawn the conclusion that he didn’t connect with the voters in the way he hoped.”

King predicted that Rep. Michele Bachmann, the winner of the straw poll and Texas Gov. Rick Perry who announced his entry into the race in a speech at a convention in South Carolina would benefit most from Pawlenty’s departure.

“You look down the line, you have to think that Rick Perry is looking at that group of people,” said King of Pawlenty’s supporters. “You have to think that the split between the Minnesota loyalty of Michele Bachmann is going to pick up Pawlenty supporters. That’s probably the two people that would be helped the most in my estimation, although I need to think about that more deeply.”

Bachmann won the Ames straw poll with about 29 percent of the vote — 4,823 votes out of a total of 16,892 ballots cast. Bachmann’s solidifies her position as an early frontrunner for the February Iowa caucuses, but she was forced to share attention with Perry after his announcement that he was entering the race.

The two candidates are expected to appear at the same event in Waterloo, Iowa Sunday though not at the same time.

“I would call that the shoot-out at OK Corral,” said Rep. King about the candidates’ planned Waterloo appearances.

More news from The Hill:

♦ Pawlenty drops out of presidential race

♦ Bachmann sidesteps gay rights questions

♦ Texas’s K Street roots move behind Perry

♦ Bachmann says she can win independents

♦ DNC chief: Obama relection in ‘good shape’

♦ Iowa governor: Romney in ‘real trouble’ if he loses caucuses

King added that there had been a strong Perry write-in campaign. “I think the thing that’s not been reported in the news is there has been a very large Perry write-in campaign going across the state. … And it wasn’t that he was just sitting in Texas and people came here and put up a vote in Rick Perry. There was an effort for a write-in campaign.”

King congratulated Bachmann on her victory but held back from endorsing her candidacy. “I want to weigh all these candidates objectively, and she carries a tremendous resume and a tremendous list of qualities. … But still I, like everyone, needs to measure who would make the best president of the United States,” he said.

“But she has done very, very well here. And I congratulate her on her victory yesterday and I am thrilled for her,” he added. “You can’t diminish, I don’t think, the charisma that Michele Bachmann used. She didn’t have a ground game. This was the force of herself as a candidate lined up against the ground game of Tim Pawlenty.”

King also defended the role the straw poll plays in winnowing the Republican presidential field. CNN host Candy Crowley noted that only 17,000 voters out of over 600,000 registered Republicans participated in the poll.

“Well, I want the people making the decision that actually care,” responded King. “People that pay the most attention are the ones that were here in Ames yesterday. They cared enough to drive from the four corners of the state, come down here to Ames. They listened to the speeches. They’ve studied these candidates. It’s all politics all the time for the people that were here yesterday. And that’s a large group of people.”

King also downplayed the appeal of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney in the state. Romney had chosen to sit out the Ames straw poll. “Romney is not playing here in Iowa right now,” said King.  “He didn’t do very well yesterday, you might have noticed. And I saw Rick Perry get more write-in than votes Romney got himself.”