Newt Gingrich's March FEC report shows the campaign holds $4.3 million dollars in debt and has $1.22 million cash on hand. The campaign raised $1.6 million in March but spent $2.01 million.

The numbers, filed after the network evening shows Friday and first released to Fox, raise questions about whether the campaign can ever pay off all its debts, with Gingrich having failed to notch a win after the Georgia primary. Meanwhile, the candidate has continued his public schedule and his wife Callista has made her own solo campaign trips in recent weeks, racking up major debts in travel and security expenses along the way. Callista is not assigned any Secret Service protection and goes on the road with private security.

At the end of February, the campaign reported that it had $1.55 million in debt, and the significant swell of red ink is a reflection of an internal audit that began in March. From Gingrich's South Carolina primary win all the way through to his loss in Louisiana, Gingrich had an active public schedule involving extensive travel and the paperwork didn't keep up. Sources with inside knowledge of the campaign say the only aspect that has been consistent within Gingrich's operation has been that it is run according to ever-changing guideposts. The candidate is said to have told staffers during the peak of his candidacy that costs shouldn't be a factor when he gave his directives. Projects could be green lighted and then cancelled at whim, with confusing and costly consequences. (read more)

April will be a time of transition in politics. Republicans are winding down their presidential primary process, President Obama continues rolling out his re-election campaign and lawmakers are turning from the work of grinding out legislation to getting busy defending their seats.

Republican frontrunner Mitt Romney has his best chance yet to lock up his party's presidential nomination with a string of primaries in states where voters should be receptive to his call for party unity in order to focus on the well-funded Obama campaign.

On April 3, Romney is counting on strong showings in Maryland and the District of Columbia, but the big test for the former Massachusetts governor and rivals Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich comes in Wisconsin. The Badger State is not just expected to be a swing state in the fall, but has been the site of some of the fiercest clashes between conservative Republicans swept into office in 2010 and powerful government-worker unions.

All the candidates, including Texas Rep. Ron Paul, have taken up the cause of embattled Gov. Scott Walker, who is facing a recall election backed by government unions outraged over his move to limit their collective bargaining power. (read more)

Newt Gingrich believes he can still thwart a Mitt Romney candidacy by forcing a brokered convention, but renewed focus on a simple Republican National Committee rule is a reminder of how unlikely that scenario would be.

Gingrich has only notched two first places finishes so far in the nominating calendar, which means that if he makes it to the convention without collecting a majority of delegates in three more states, he will fail to meet the five-state threshold required to qualify for the first ballot. This is according to RNC Rule No. 40, which states:

"Each candidate for nomination for the president of the United States and vice president of the United States shall demonstrate the support of a plurality of delegates from each of five (5) or more states, severally, prior to the presentation of the name of that candidate for nomination."
 
That doesn’t ruin his chances, his supporters say, because a motion can still be made in subsequent rounds of voting to add his name back into the mix. All that would be needed is for the candidate to collect enough unbound delegates (more and more free up with each voting round) to demonstrate he has a majority of their support in five states. (read more)

Presidential politics ramp up considerably in March as the Republican nomination process heads into the home stretch.

After two months of nominating contests, just over 300 Republican delegates have been allocated, leaving all contenders far from the 1,144 delegates needed to win the party’s nomination. But in March alone, there are 735 delegates on the line – more than any other month. (With that said, the delegate count is complicated)

And no single day in the Republican calendar carries as much significances as March 6 – Super Tuesday – when 419 delegates are at stake in 10 contests across the country. There will be primary elections in Ohio, Virginia, Georgia, Massachusetts, Vermont, Oklahoma and Tennessee and caucus meetings to start selecting delegates in Alaska, Idaho, and North Dakota. Wyoming also starts its county conventions on March 6 with 12 delegates at stake, but they run through March 10. (read more)

As part of a broad effort to rebound after the Florida primary, Newt Gingrich's campaign has appointed a new chief of staff-- Patrick Millsaps.

Millsaps is a prominent lawyer from Newt's home state of Georgia. He joined the campaign the week before the Iowa caucuses and until this move was serving as the deputy general counsel.

Millsaps made the transition during the last day or so of the Florida campaign. He is a partner at Hall Booth Smith & Plover.

His new title isn't a shake-up. It's part of the campaign's efforts to beef back up staffing and campaign structure post-Iowa. Newt 2012 is still very much run by the candidate, but Gingrich has broadened his cadre of advisers. In addition to making sure the trains run on time, Millsaps will help with messaging as the race expands to multiple states. His promotion comes as the campaign prepares to challenge Florida's "winner-take-all" delegate allocation - so far, the state's 50 delegates were awarded to Mitt Romney. (read more)

Campaign Carl Cameron is out on the trail in full force. He caught up with Newt Gingrich on his campaign bus in Sioux City Friday and asked about everything from what some say is a break with his positive campaign pledge, to why he says Ron Paul sits to the left of President Obama politically.

Here is a sample of the back and forth. You can catch the full interview on Special Report tonight at 6pm ET including Gingrich's clever answer to whether being asked the same questions over and over bothers him.

Q - Are Iowa republicans right to fear a Ron Paul win here, could that hurt this state's political reputation?

A - Sure... His primary youth backers are for him because he wants to legalize drugs. He has said that he doesn't care if Iranians get nuclear weapon. I think it was Dick Morris who said he is to the left of Obama, and whole series of issues. Ron Paul is a good protest candidate. He would be impossible as a serious presidential candidate.

Q - Was it premature on Dec 1st to predict you'd win the nomination? (read more)

The Perry campaign is reviewing its options, after what could be a major mistake-- failing to qualify for the GOP primary in Virginia.

Shortly after discovering the news, Perry spokesman Ray Sullivan issued a statement saying, "Despite aggressive efforts collecting thousands of Virginia signatures after Governor Perry's mid-August entry into the race, we were notified this evening of apparently falling short of the 10,000 voter signatures needed to qualify."

Virginia has some of the toughest primary ballot rules. The state requires, 10 thousand signatures from registered voters, 400 from each of the 11 congressional districts. (read more)

If gay marriage is a voter's primary issue in the 2012 election, then Newt Gingrich says it's perfectly okay not to vote for him in a would-be battle against President Obama.

Speaking in Oskaloosa, Iowa, Tuesday afternoon, Gingrich was confronted by a man who asked the former House speaker how he planned to engage with lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender who agree with him on other issues, but not on Gingrich's opposition to same-sex marriage.

In a cordial exchange, Gingrich said on that issue, there's little room for engagement. The two then agreed to disagree. (read more)

In a new poll of South Carolina Republican primary goers, Newt Gingrich has charged to the top, building a wide margin over Mitt Romney, 38.4 percent to 21.5 percent.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry comes in a distant third with 9 percent of the vote.

The results of the Winthrop Poll -- taken between Nov. 27 and Dec. 4 of 1,073 registered voters in The Palmetto State -- show that among likely Republican presidential primary voters, Gingrich has made a dramatic jump since September. At that time, the same polling company found Gingrich earned just 5.3 percent of the vote behind Romney, who came in second with 27.3 percent and Perry, who led the pack with 30.5 percent.

According to the poll, Herman Cain, who suspended his campaign on Saturday, still maintained support among Republicans though it had dropped from 7.7 percent in September to 6.6 percent in December.

The survey also weighed in on national events, and interviewed Democrats and independents as well. It listed 81 percent saying the economy is fairly or very bad, and 47.4 percent saying national economic conditions are getting worse. (read more)