Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich meets students during his visit to campus in April 2010. A handful of GU students have joined the growing national movement endorsing Gingrich for 2012 elections.
With the recent surge in support for Newt Gingrich in the GOP primary race, a chapter of the national Students for Newt organization is joining the ranks of candidate groups on campus.
Beginning their efforts with a publicity push today, the budding organization hopes to reach the same prominence as groups like Georgetown for Obama and Hoyas for Huntsman.
The chapter currently has three members, although Deputy Coalition Director Kevin Preskenis (COL ’12) said that involvement will increase as the group became more established.
“We’re very much in the organizing stage,” he said.
Preskenis also serves as the national youth coordinator for the nation-wide Students for Newt organization. While he assumed his positions in Students for Newt last week, he previously served as managing editor for Renewing American Leadership, a non-profit charity founded by Gingrich for which he had been working since 2009. Preskenis left the organization to work for Gingrich’s presidential campaign.
Students for Newt hopes to expand to 85 campuses across the country in the next few weeks, according to Preskenis. The organization is currently focusing its efforts on colleges and universities in Iowa and South Carolina, states that are important in the first rounds of the upcoming Republican primary elections.
Angela Morabito (SFS ’12), a member of the Georgetown chapter of Students for Newt, began working as the national movement’s communications director for the D.C. and Virginia area a week ago. A Georgia native, Morabito sees a personal connection with Gingrich.
“Newt used to be my neighbor, so I grew up knowing about him,” she said.
Morabito said she is optimistic about the group’s future, despite their slow start.
“I think we started at just the right time,” she said. “This is a good opportunity, because when you hear the words ‘student activism’ or ‘student campaigning’ you think of Students for Obama, you think of Occupy DC, you think of [groups] that are pretty far left. For people who share a different viewpoint, and there are many of us on campus, … this is really just a great chance to be a student leader.”
Correction: The article previously stated that Kevin Preskenis (COL ’12) is currently the managing editor for Renewing American Leadership. Preskenis left the charity to work for Newt Gingrich’s presidential campaign. The article also previously said that Angela Morabito (SFS ’12) is in the class of 2013. The article has been updated to reflect these changes.
