More than a half-dozen of Gingrich’s top staff left, including Tyler, Schoen feld, campaign manager Rob Johnson, senior adviser Sam Dawson, New Hampshire adviser David Carney, South Carolina adviser Katon Dawson, and Georgia adviser Scott Rials. The entire six-person staff in Iowa resigned, according to Schoenfeld.
“There needs to be an investment of candidate time, to not only actually do the retail politics but to the fund-raising and everything else… . It was not evident that what I thought needed to be done meshed with what he thought could be done,’’ said Schoenfeld.
“I don’t think the trip to Greece was very helpful,’’ Tyler said.
Also yesterday, Gingrich’s national campaign cochairman, Sonny Perdue, the former governor of Georgia, announced he was leaving the campaign and had signed on with opponent Tim Pawlenty, the former governor of Minnesota.
In a backhanded slap at Gingrich, Perdue said that Pawlenty was “the person I now believe stands the greatest chance of defeating President Obama.’’
“He [Pawlenty] is the only candidate who has laid out a real plan to grow the American economy, and his track record in Minnesota is proof he’s the right man for the job,’’ Perdue said in a statement on Pawlenty’s campaign website.
Despite the defections, Gingrich said he intended to continue his campaign.
The resignations are the most visible sign of the serious turmoil within the Gingrich camp, and the latest in what was a bumpy candidacy even before Gingrich’s long-anticipated jump into the race last month.
Gingrich’s viability has long been in doubt because of his two divorces and admissions of infidelity.
Then came disclosures that he and his wife, Callista, had run up between $250,000 and $500,000 in credit card bills at the jeweler Tiffany & Co.
And in his first week after announcing his candidacy, Gingrich infuriated many fellow Republicans with his stinging criticism of a GOP House budget proposal that proposed major changes to Medicare, and was forced to backpedal furiously.
