After a disappointing finish in the Iowa caucus on Tuesday night, Texas Gov. Rick Perry announced, via Twitter, that he was staying in the race and moving on to South Carolina’s primary on Jan. 21.
“And the next leg of the marathon is the Palmetto State…Here we come South Carolina!!!” Perry wrote from his personal Twitter feed. He meant that literally too. The tweet included an awkward photo of him jogging along a river, sporting massive winter gloves, a thumbs up, and an uncharacteristically disheveled look.
On Tuesday night, Perry told a crowd in Iowa, where he came in fifth, that he would return to Texas to reassess his campaign. According to Politico, the tweet announcing that he was staying in the race came as a surprise to some, including those in his camp who thought “reassess” was code for “end.”
As for using Twitter as a means to announce that his campaign wasn’t over, one strategist told Politico “welcome to campaign 2012.”