Romney Expands Ad Campaign to South Carolina

By JIM KUHNHENN
Associated Press Writer

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney will renew an advertising push in South Carolina on Wednesday, expanding a media campaign that lately has been focused on Iowa and New Hampshire.

The former Massachusetts governor's campaign will shift an ad to South Carolina that aired in Iowa and New Hampshire last week. It showed Romney jogging and praised him for meeting "extraordinary challenges."

At the same time, the campaign will air a new ad in Iowa and New Hampshire that features his wife, Ann, commending her husband's record.

"Every place Mitt has gone, he has solved problems that people said were nearly impossible," Ann Romney says in the commercial.

An announcer then lists Romney's work as head of the 2002 Winter Olympics and as governor.

The South Carolina ad will run in major markets in South Carolina, including Greenville, Charleston, Columbia and Myrtle Beach. It is scheduled to run for six days and costs more than $200,000, according to information compiled by another presidential campaign.

Romney has been running radio ads in the state and conducted a television ad campaign in the state earlier this year, mainly in March and April.

Romney has spent more than $6 million in advertising, much of it in Iowa and New Hampshire. His poll numbers in both states have risen as the public became more familiar with him.

South Carolina presents another front for Romney, who has been making a special appeal to the social conservatives who are the core bloc of GOP primary voters. South Carolina Republicans have scheduled their primary for Jan. 19.