No official Iowa caucus winner, but Santorum got most votes

UPDATE: Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum will be listed in Republican Party of Iowa records as the winner of the party's 2012 precinct caucuses, but his 34-vote victory over GOP presidential rival Mitt Romney will be accompanied by an asterisk.

That's because party officials said Thursday that results from eight of the 1,774 precincts were missing when they conducted the vote certification process, meaning they likely will never know what the final tallies were for the candidates who competed in the Jan. 3 balloting.

The certified results of 1,766 precincts made public Thursday showed Santorum with 29,839 votes, followed by Romney – a former Massachusetts governor – with 29,805, Texas Rep. Ron Paul in third with 26,036, former House speaker Newt Gingrich with 16,163, Texas Gov. Rick Perry with 12,557, Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann – who quit the race one day after Iowa's first-in-the-nation caucuses – with 6,046 and former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman with 739. Party officials said 121,503 votes were certified.

Read more at IowaCaucus.com