ShareThisWASHINGTON - Texas Gov. Rick Perry's retreat Thursday from the race for the Republican presidential nomination is likely to be a permanent exit from the 2012 race.
He makes a poor pick for vice president, and Tea Partiers probably pressured him to bow out so the best anti-Mitt Romney candidate -- possibly Newt Gingrich or Rick Santorum -- would rise to second place, if not the top, Saturday in the South Carolina primary, political pundits said.
Notable Texas Republicans in Congress had nothing but glowing praise for the governor Thursday, an acknowledgement that he's still the sitting governor.
But the most conservative wing of the Republican Party had a message for Perry, the presidential nomination candidate: "Get out now so that at least our candidate will do well on Saturday," Paul Fabrizio, political science professor at McMurry University in Abilene, Texas, said.
During a withdrawal speech Thursday morning in South Carolina, Perry gave Gingrich a qualified endorsement, saying the former House speaker was not a perfect candidate but the best conservative choice.
Larry J. Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, said Perry helped Gingrich mightily by withdrawing and endorsing him.
"I suspect that he's helped to make this a very close, competitive race, which it was not at the beginning of this week," Sabato said.
As for the vice presidential slot, Romney won't pick Perry, and Gingrich is already strong in the South and will need help from elsewhere, Sabato said.
Sabato and other political observers agreed Perry had shown himself a poor campaigner on the national stage, squelching his chances for a slot on the ticket as a running mate.
"I would say Rick Perry's problem was that you never have a second chance to make a first impression, and his impressions in the debates doomed him forever," said Sean F. Evans, chairman of the political science department at Union University in Tennessee.
Fabrizio said Perry wasn't prepared to run for president.
"He jumped in the race because he saw the weakness in the other candidates not because he was ready," Fabrizio said.
It's uncertain what Perry's campaign failure means for politics in Texas, but he's got a bright past and future, judging from congressional Republicans' statements.
"I congratulate Governor Perry for recognizing that America is in critical need of new leadership and stepping up to the plate to help the nation change course," Texas Sen. John Cornyn said. "Governor Perry brought the Texas success story to the national stage."
Cornyn's statement went on to say the senator is confident in Perry's leadership of Texans.
Perry is "still a very influential politician, so now is not the time to go jumping on his grave," Fabrizio said.
The statement from Cornyn ignored questions submitted to his press office Thursday: What does the senator think this means for the race? Why does he think Perry's campaign wasn't successful? Is Cornyn going to endorse anyone now?
Texas GOP Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison's staff declined to comment on the latest chapter in the story of the opponent who beat her in the Republican governor's primary in 2010.
Texas Rep. Mac Thornberry still plans to support the winner of the GOP presidential nomination and hasn't endorsed anyone.
"I'm watching what happens like everybody else is," Thornberry said in an interview. "There have been lots of twists and turns in this race, and it'll be interesting to see what happens on Saturday and beyond that."
The Republican from Clarendon said he wasn't sure what Perry's dropping out means for the race or why Perry's campaign wasn't successful.
"It's always a combination of the candidate and the environment," Thornberry said. "I don't know the proportions in this case."
Perry campaign staff member Ray Sullivan told reporters Thursday in South Carolina that Perry might make another bid for president next time around, and he also might run for governor again in 2014.
Jim Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas, said both are logical possibilities.
"At this moment in time, it's hard to see," Henson said.
Henson said to take Sullivan's statements with a grain of salt because of the timing.
"It's an emotional moment, and the future is not especially clear in those moments," Henson said.
(SHNS Texas regional reporter Trish Choate can be reached at choatet(at)shns.com. Memphis, Tenn., Commercial Appeal reporter Bartholomew Sullivan can be reached at sullivanb(at)shns.com.)
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
