Rick Santorum finished the Iowa Republican caucuses 34 votes ahead of Mitt Romney, but results from several precincts are missing and the full actual results may never be known, according to a final certified tally released Thursday by the Iowa GOP. The new numbers show 29,839 votes for Santorum and 29,805 votes for Romney, according to the party. The initial returns from Iowa gave Romney a razor-thin eight-vote margin of victory over Santorum, reinforcing the former Massachusetts governor's frontrunner status and giving him a major momentum boost heading into the New Hampshire primaries. Romney went on to win New Hampshire easily, seemingly making him the first non-incumbent Republican in modern history to win the first two contests of the cycle.
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Santorum says he learned of the revised result before dawn Thursday
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Santorum finishes with a 34-vote advantage over Mitt Romney in Iowa
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Romney calls Santorum, but campaigns differ on whether it was to concede
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Romney was thought to have won the caucuses by eight votes
While @placeholder had a slight advantage in the certified tally, results from eight precincts were missing and will never be recovered -- a fact that leaves the question of who actually finished first in the caucuses unanswered.