Romney Cruising Toward Win in Nevada

"Mitt Romney is headed for a big win in Nevada on Saturday," said Dean Debnam, president of Public Policy Polling. "He's winning with virtually every demographic group we track."

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Romney, in economically hard-hit Nevada for three campaign events on Friday, welcomed the latest jobs report showing U.S. unemployment dipping to 8.3 percent, but said President Barack Obama's policies had prevented a broader recovery.

"We can do better," said Romney, who has touted his business experience as head of a private equity group as a cure for the ailing economy. "Nearly 24 million Americans remain unemployed, underemployed, or have just stopped looking for work."

Nevada has the highest state unemployment rate, 12.6 percent in December, and the highest foreclosure rate, putting the economy in the spotlight before Saturday's contest as it will be in the November general election.

Gingrich called the job gains "anemic" and promised to push for revisions to the tax code and the repeal of federal regulations that he said suffocated job growth.

"Anemic growth is not growth," Gingrich said. "I am proposing aggressive changes that will instantly make the United States a magnet for new businesses and allow entrepreneurs to create new products, services and jobs."

The former U.S. House speaker again criticized Romney for his comment earlier this week that he did not care about the poor because they had a social safety net.

'OBAMA LIGHT'

"It isn't good enough for the Republican Party to nominate Obama light," he said at a campaign rally at a country and western bar in Las Vegas. "If you're a genuine conservative, first of all you don't say you don't care about the poor."

Romney backtracked on the comments about the poor after he made them in a CNN interview on Wednesday. He told a reporter on Thursday he had merely botched a line he often used in campaign speeches.