US Republican races tight in southern primaries

US Republicans Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich faced off in a pair of high-stakes Deep South presidential primaries on Tuesday, and early results showed very tight races in both Mississippi and Alabama.

The contests are critical for all three top contenders in a volatile Republican White House campaign that already has featured numerous surges, collapses and voter mood swings.

A victory for Romney in either state would be a critical breakthrough that could put the front-runner on a path to the nomination by proving his ability to appeal to the party's core conservatives in the Deep South.

Gingrich, who represented Georgia in Congress, needs a win in Alabama or Mississippi to keep his struggling campaign afloat. Santorum hopes to knock Gingrich out of the race and consolidate conservative opposition to Romney.

The Republican showdowns in the Deep South, a party stronghold in the general election, are a crucial test in the battle between Santorum and Gingrich to become the conservative alternative to Romney.

With about 17 percent of precincts counted in Mississippi, Santorum had 34 percent of the vote while Romney and Gingrich each had 30 percent. In Alabama, Santorum led with 34 percent to Gingrich's 29 percent and Romney's 28 percent with 2 percent of votes counted.

Both states were a three-way dead heat in polls heading into Tuesday's voting, with Romney showing surprising strength as Santorum and Gingrich split the states' big bloc of very conservative, evangelical voters.

Gingrich and Santorum have urged each other to get out of the race, but Gingrich indicated in a radio interview on Tuesday that he and the former Pennsylvania senator eventually could form a united front against Romney.

"I wouldn't be surprised once we're through the primaries, if it still looks like it does right now, to see the conservatives come together," Gingrich said on the "Rick & Bubba Show" in Birmingham, Alabama.

"A majority (of Republican voters) are saying, ‘Not Romney,'" said Gingrich, a former speaker of the House of Representatives. "The biggest bloc is saying Romney, but it's not a big enough bloc to be a majority. We now are beginning to think he will literally not be able to get the delegates to get the nomination."

Romney has opened a big lead in delegates in the Republican race to pick a challenger to President Barack Obama in the November 6 election, but he has been unable to capture the hearts of conservatives who distrust him for some of the moderate stances he took as governor of liberal Massachusetts.