coming up shortly. gloria borger is standing by with david gergen, donna brazile, and ari fleischer. >> governor romney, what kind of debate did you think you had tonight? >> i thought it was terrific, and i was delighted with the debate. it was a big night for me and for the people who support me. you saw the response of the audience. it's a big step forward and it's going to give me the boost i need going into the last couple days before the primary. >> you were pretty aggressive, i couldn't help but notice, in taking on newt gingrich. you seemed to turn every attack he made on you into an attack on him. particularly the attacks he made on the campaign trail about your finances. >> when i'm shot at, i'll return fire. i'm no shrinking violet. thanks. >> back to you, anderson. >> it certainly was perhaps a more energized mitt romney than we have seen in privious deba s debates. earlier this week in florida, he appeared to be energized. he has a new debate coach. how much of a role that played, unclear. he and speaker gingrich went back and forth on a number of issues. immigration, what was said in various campaign commercials, taxes, investments, and the like. a lot to talk about. we have a full panel who are joining us. let's check in with david gergen who is in the hall. what did you make of the debate? >> anderson, fascinating debate. very exciting. a lot of people are pleased about it. i don't think there was a clear winner tonight. if anything, the surprise may have been how well rick santorum did. he was unusually strong. second straight debate for him, but here is the point. i think that if the momentum has shifted as the polls suggest, and it seems to be true, then you have to say that newt gingrich needed a knockout punch tonight. he needed to reverse the moment momentum. he did not get that. i believe that for mitt romney's end, this was a good night. a night he can come out of here and say, i held my own against him. we went mano a mano. i did well tonight. different from south carolina. the romney people should be happy tonight coming out of this. they may be close to securing florida, and if they secure florida, they're much closer to the nomination. >> i'm joined by wolf blitzer. you did an excellent job, as always. what did you make of the debate? what stood out to you? >> they all were on their game. they did a good job. ron paul, we know where he stands on so many of the issues. he was predict blgable, strong, good. the exchanges, especially at the beginning between gingrich and romney, were pretty tough, serious. there were differences between the two individuals. santorum did himself some favors today. a lot of people if you look at the polls have been writing him off, but maybe he'll get a bounce. >> he felt tonight was crucial that he get the message across. i want to bring in ari fleischer. from the republican side, how did you see it toonchlt? >> this was a great night for mitt romney. mitt romney showed an aggressive side i haven't seen in him bfl. he took it to newt gingrich on several occasions. he did it in a cool manner, showing a bit of an alpha dog manner. and newt didn't have the commanding night he had in south carolina. and that hurt him because for him to close the gap here in florida, a close race, he needed another big, good night. rick santorum was strong. you have to give credit to rick santorum, and ron paul was funny. he had the best lines of the night. >> john king is with former senator santorum. >> i'm with santorum and his mother who is now famous in social media. good to see you. you introduced your mom at the beginning of the meeting, all over twitterverse. no way you're 93 years young. >> ari fleischer was talking, senator, that you had a strong performance. the last couple debates, you got great revies. the question sometimes comes down to resources. in a state like florida, you decided not to run tv ads, you decided not to stay here friday night because you're looking ahead. is this a missed opportunity? >> i have been here, i was the first person down here in florida. i have been here many, many times before the past week. i'm here really through monday, and i found in the last two elections in new hampshire and south carolina, they're wasted days because you can't compain, so our feeling was, let's take off. we have nevada just four days later, and we want to head up to nevada and start working out there. >> you have been very consistent criticizing romney and gingrich on the mandate for health care. romney, i believe, had a strong debate performance tonight. but the one time you seemed to be on defense was when you kept after him. he was defending his mandate, he said at one point, it's not anything to get angry about. >> don't confusion passion with anger. i'm passionate about this because people in this country don't want a government that can force them to engage in commercial activity much less force them to do a whole host of other things like the cap and trade proposal he had come is going to drive up utility costs or the wall street bailout that taxpayers are paying hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out wall street while people here suffer. the idea that romney things i'm angry, i think a lot of people are angry when they say the government is going to force them to by insurance as a resident of the state. >> i know it's a horse race question, but as the race goes on, they say where does rick santorum get a break. you won iowa. you have to win somewhere, where does it come. >> >> this is proportional. and proportional allocation of delegates in most of the states coming up. and we're running strong campaigns. in several states, we have the resources. we have raised over twice as much money in the last three weeks as we did in the last nine month. we have the resources to spread our wings and we're going to engage in the campaign. as we have seen here tonight, a lot of baggage, a lot of problems with intwo co-front runners. we're going to start moving up again. our time will come. >> i'm going to let you spend time with your most loyal florida voter. i agree with what everyone is saying. there's no way you're 93 years young. not happening, not at all. take care tonight. anderson, back to you. >> i want to check in with eric erickson. you have not been a fan of governor romney and his campaign. how did you think he did and how did you think newt gingrich did? >> they did badly. romney got the better of newt over all. the winners were santorum and paul. largely because they stayed out of the fray. the pej lnt of the runners allowed santorum and paul to shine. so many questions, to wolf's credit, were on domestic policy issue and issues related to florida, instead of domestic issues. rick santorum had the best night of any of the candidates on the stage. >> donna brazile, it seems like this race is going to continue beyond florida. >> oh, there's no question, anderson. florida is very important for republicans. this is the last contest before the all-important debates. there are a couple places, but mitt romney knew he had to come in, he had to look newt gingrich in the eye and stare him down. he did very well, but santorum probably did himself good tonight by, you know, not only standing his ground but taking his fight to both romney as well as newt gingrich. newt gingrich was flat tonight, but he's not out of it. he still has a lot of head wind going into the important florida primary next week. >> wolf blitzer in the exchange with gingrich, went back and forth on the appropriateness of the question. i want to show the exchange to our viewers. >> earlier this week, you said governor romney, after he released his taxes, you said you were satisfied with the level of transparency of his personal finance s i want to reirate and ask you, are you satisfied with the level of transparency with his personal finances. >> we have a great relationship, we have gone back a long way. i'm with him. this is a nonsense question. how about if the four of us agree for the rest of the evening -- >> you made an issue of this this week when you said that he lives in a world of swiss bank and cayman island bank accounts. i didn't say that. you did. >> i did. i'm perfectly happy to say that on some tv show, but you have a chance -- >> you make a serious accusation against governor romney like that, you need to explain that. >> you want to try again. i mean -- >> wouldn't it be nice if people didn't make accusations that they weren't willing to defend here. >> a really interesting exchange. it contributes to the idea that a lot of people felt newt gingrich was flat tonight. >> you know, he was the one who raised the issue of the cayman islands, the swiss bank account. he made a serious allegation against romney. i thought it would be a great opportunity to clarify, explain what he meant about it. he didn't want to talk about it. when i finally pressed him, he responded. >> there have been a number of allegations on the campaign trail that showed up. ari fliethser, there was a campaign commercial that mitt romney is running in which he said that newt gingrich said spanish is the language of the ghetto. he didn't say that word for word. he implied it sefrveral years a. what did you think of that exchange? >> on so many exchanges, mitt romney was taking it to newt, but that one was confusion. most viewers,nenti unless they' fact checkers, they got lost on that one. >> we have a lot to talk about in the hour ahead. we're going to take a quick break. let us know what you think on facebook, google plus, follow us on twitter. up next, a roundtable on the key moments of tonight. we'll replay the key moments, the ones voters may base their decisions on. also, key moments when gingrich and romney traded direct attacks over the advertising war each is waging, and the war that big-named republicans waged today to stop newt gingrich. we'll talk about that ahead. ♪ ( whirring and crackling sounds ) man: assembly lines that fix themselves. the most innovative companies are doing things they never could before, by building on the cisco intelligent network. lord of the carry-on. sovereign of the security line. you never take an upgrade for granted. and you rent from national. because only national lets you choose any car in the aisle. and go. you can even take a full-size or above. and still pay the mid-size price. i deserve this. 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[ male announcer ] red lobster's four course seafood feast is back. get soup, salad, cheddar bay biscuits, dessert and choose one of 7 entrees. four courses for only $15. offer ends soon. i'm jody gonzalez, red lobster manager and i sea food differently. we're back in jacksonville, florida. what a really exciting debate you have just witnessed. moments after the debate, days before the crucial florida primary. we're going to check in with our full panel shortly. i want to show you some of the key moment from this evening in case you missed them. plenty for voters to consider. take a look. >> ladies and gentlemen, the republican candidates for president of the united states. >> i'm here with a north florida resident who lived down the beach from jacksonville, my mom, who is 93 years old, is with me tonight. >> i thin we spend way too much time worrying about the border between afghanistan and pakistan. use some of those resources on our own border. >> is he still the most anti-immigrant candidate? >> of the four of us, yes. >> i'm not anti-immigrant. my father was born in mexico, my wife's father was born in wales. they came to this country. the idea that i'm anti-immigrant is repulsive. >> i want the grandmother to have some right for residency but not citizenship so he or she contributes their life with dignity within the law. >> there are not 11 million -- our problem is not 11 million grandmother. our problem is -- [ applause ] >> governor romney always shares of fannie mae and freddie mac. he made millions off selling that. he has had investment of goldman sachs which is closing on floridians. >> have you checked your own investments yorb also have investments in fannie mae and freddie mac. >> they both made money from fanny and freddie. should they return that money? >> that subject doesn't interest me a whole lot. >> the bigger issue here is these two gentlemen who are out distracting by the most important issues we have by playing petty politics. can we set aside that newt was a member of congress and used the skills he developed as a member of congress to advise company, and mitt romney is a guy who is wealthy because he worked hard. you need to loov that alone and focus on the issues. >> how about if the four of us agree for the rest of the evening to talk about issues that relate to america. >> you said he lives in a world of swiss bank and cayman island bank accounts. i didn't say that, you did. >> let's put behind this idea of attacking me because of my investments or my money and say what you accomplished in your lifetient be seen as a detriment but an asset. >> i'll challenge any of these guys to a 25-mile bike ride in the heat of texas. >> i don't want to be the country that got to the moon first, turn around and say it doesn't matter. let the chinese dominate space, what do we care? >> this idea of going state to state and promising what people want to hear, promising hundreds of billions of dollars to make them happy got us into the trouble we're in now. we have to say no to this spending. >> what he said is factually incorrect. your mandate is no different from barack obama's man dade. it's the same mandate. you take over 100% like he takes over 100%. required the same fines you put in place in massachusetts, fines he put in place on the federal level. >> there's no doubt about it, the stakes were high, the pressure was intense. we'll bring you more key moments throughout the hour, throughout the night, talking about what they add up to. john king, also political analyst gloria borger, david gergen, donna brazile, ari fleischer, and eric erickson joins us by remote. ari, it surprised me that newt gingrich, who has been lobbying these attacks against governor romney in his investments in fannie mae and freddie mac seemed unaware or unprepared for him to say, you know what, you have invested in them, too. >> when you look at opposition research and having a campaign structure underneat you, romney has a big one, and newt is newt. he has his own coverage. he doesn't have many people helping him. i think that was a surprise. it took him by surprise. that's what i meant about romney had a good night, stepping up his game, going after newt. jab, jab, jab. newt throws haymakers and he didn't get a chance to connect on his haymakers tonight. he was flat. >> and romney demanded an apology from newt gingrich for the language he used calling him anti-immigration, saying it was repulsive. we haven't heard that out of mitt romney. this is mitt romney taking it to newt gingrich. >> he knew that tonight was critical. >> everybody knew that tonight was critical. the person who won the debate tonight was likely to win the primary. this is newt's last chance. that moment on the taxes was, i think, symbolic of the whole evening. he threw his punch, he thought he it a really solid point, and romney was ready for him and surprised him. i think that was right, and then santorum said would you stop being trivial and go after each other, and he looked bigger and he looked good. >> he's had several strong performances in a row. does he have the resources and the psychology of the race to do that. we'll see if he can do this further on. i think governor romney was more assertive. on the immigration answer, he went after gingrich and at the same time, he softened his position, we're not going to throw grandmother out of the country. and he was less defensive about his wealth. his staff has been pushing it for month. he's private, doesn't like to talk about . was much less defensive, tried to turn it to his advantage. i made a lot of money, i paid my taxes, yes, i did. what's the issue, mr. speaker. >> we have the clip about the grandmother. >> i'm not going to go find grandmothers and take them out of their homes and deport them. thoetz are your words, not my words. to use that rhetoric suggests to people somehow if you're not willing to keep people here who violated the law, you're anti-imgrnlt. nothing could be further from the truth. i'm pro-immigrant. >> you accept the fact a family is going to take care of their grandmother. the fact you're going to push them out by saying they can't get a job, i think the grandmother is going to be here. all i want to do here is let her be there illegally. >> the problem isn't 11 million grandmothers. all right? >> that line got a huge applause in this auditorium. eric erickson, to john's point about rick santorum, though he clearly had a strong night on the stage and received a lot of applause on the stage for some of his lines, does he have the staying power. clearly his strategy would be that newt gingrich would implode and he would go against romney. is that a strategy that is still viable? >> i don't know that it is, he got a big endorsement from evangelicals, and it didn't do him good. i wouldn't be surprised if there's some effort to keep him in to keep hurting gingricgingr. on the other issue, anderson, on the question tonight on immigration, i have to say that i thought that gingrich and romney hurt each other in the debate, but in that moment with wolf blitzer that you came where gingrich all of a sudden, all these things blowing up in his face, let's stop. and he went after wolf, and suddenly, because of romney's response, he got the better of him, the crowd turned on gingrich. you live by the debate, die by the debate. i think gingrich lost florida because of it. >> you wanted crowd response. you got crowd response tonight. >> romney goded newt gingrich into answering these questions and getting more involved because you know, as eric pointed out, gingrich said, okay, let's just stop this, and romney turned on him and said, you know what, you ought to be able to answer on the stage what you have been saying at your rallies about me, to my face. >> there were two debates this week, and newt gingrich had an opportunity with all of the momentum coming out of south carolina to put romney on the defensive, on his money, taxes, on his stance on immigration, but he decided to hold back, and that hurt him. santorum was clever. he was strong. he managed to combine the anti-mitt, the liberal health care with the anti-newt, the washington insider, so overall, he had a great night. but you know what, conservatives want electability, somebody who can beat obama. can santorum rise strong enough to beat the top tier candidates. >> i thought there was two debates in a different sense in that romney was going against gingrich, and he got the better end of that. indirectly, this was also starting a debate with barack obama. i thought on that issue, donna, i'm cure yious about your view,t i don't think he came across so well. tllz rr a likability question about him as time goes on that he has to face up to. i'm not sure he's somebody people really want in their living rooms a lot. >> but his wife was fabulous. >> near term, i think he helped himself, but on the longer term questions -- >> the point is very well taken, but the point is you can see now in governor romney, if we go back six months, he wasn't worried about the near term. another interesting point, when he criticized gingrich on space, he's trying to take away the tea party vote. they're not sure if they can afford this, and he's getting tanked. the only mistake i think governor romney made, when he turned to senator santorum and said it's not worth getting angry about. a lot of tea pa