Huckabee Won't Seek Republican Presidential Nomination in 2012

May 15 (Bloomberg) -- Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, a Baptist pastor turned cable news star, said he won't run for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012.  "My answer is clear and firm: I will not seek the Republican nomination for president," Huckabee, now a Fox News Channel commentator who ran for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008, said yesterday at the close of his program. He called it a "spiritual" choice that contradicts support he sees in opinion polls.

"All the factors say go, but my heart says no," said Huckabee, who plans instead to continue his show on Fox News.  Huckabee, 55, is a favorite of socially conservative voters who make up a key bloc in Iowa and South Carolina, important early voting states in the party's nominating contests. His decision to pass on the nomination reshapes a Republican field still forming, creating an opening for candidates with strong socially conservative records.  "It completely changes the race," said Rich Bond, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, who ran President George H.W. Bush's 1988 campaign in Iowa. "Removing the Iowa frontrunner from the race is a very big deal."

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