Ron Paul said Thursday that he's running for president "because time has come around to the point where the people are agreeing with much of what I've been saying for 30 years."
"So I think the time is right," Paul said in officially announcing his candidacy for the GOP nomination on ABC's "Good Morning America." The Texas congressman was set to follow his announcement with a 10 a.m. speech in Exeter, N.H., as well as an address Friday night to the Grafton County Republican Memorial dinner in the state.
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Paul's 2012 campaign has picked up right where he left off in 2008 — generating major online buzz, successfully rallying his dedicated, libertarian-minded following, and raising big grassroots money via his patented "money bombs." He hauled in more than $1 million online last week during a 24-hour period leading up to the first presidential debate.
Though Paul launched his campaign from New Hampshire — the "live free or die" state is an ideal stronghold for the libertarian standard-bearer — his team has made clear he also intends to play hard in Iowa. He's one of the only presidential hopefuls to have set up a campaign office there, and has frequented the state in recent months. Paul also tapped three members of the state party's central committee to chair his campaign in the state.
A CNN/Opinion Research poll last week showed him running stronger against President Barack Obama than any other GOP candidate.
And unlike last time, when Paul was relegated to fringe media coverage for much of the race, he's now attracting widespread attention. With Paul receiving some credit for kick-starting the tea party movement — sometimes called its "godfather" — and keeping up his longtime push to audit the Federal Reserve, it would seem that the decades he's spent beating the libertarian drum have reached an apex.
Even so, few Republican insiders or tea party leaders expect him to be a force for the nomination when all is said and done.
"Ron Paul has his fans and they will keep him going, but that is it. His campaign will gain little traction," Tea Party Nation founder Judson Phillips predicted. "A majority of those in the [tea party] movement do not think Ron Paul is a good candidate.
"His most recent comments about the [Osama] bin Laden raid have really hurt him," Phillips added, referring to Paul's comments that he wouldn't have authorized the raid to take out the terror leader. It's that kind of isolationist foreign policy that has long made him a libertarian hero, even as it also alienates him from establishment GOP leaders.
"I was talking about the procedure, I endorse the whole idea of going after him," Paul said Friday morning. "I have no qualms about getting him, I'm glad that he's gone."
Levi Russell, a spokesman for Tea Party Express, said that Paul "has some dedicated fans, and I'm sure they'll be out in force. But broadly, I think this is still wide-open. ... Paul isn't a new face in the crowd, so he'll need to work hard to sell his ideas to a broad audience."
Paul first entered the House in 1979, serving for three terms. He ran for president on the Libertarian Party ticket in 1988, and returned to the House in 1997, where has has served since.
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