CPAC 2011: Meet the Republican presidential contenders

An unofficial starting gun for the race to become the Republican Party's candidate to run against Barack Obama in 2012 has been fired this week at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington DC.


Speech Reviewers

Mike Bayham is a New Orleans-based political consultant - a social and fiscal conservative, who has been a delegate at each Republican National Convention since 1996.

Charlotte Evans is a Republican student activist in Wisconsin, with a strong interest in energy policy. She describes herself as a fiscal, pro-life, and federalist conservative.

All the main contenders apart from Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee appeared at the conference to deliver speeches designed to test the water and raise their public profile.

None have yet officially declared their candidacy.

Here, two of the 11,000 Republicans attending the conference rate the speeches given by eight of the potential 2012 candidates: Mitt Romney, Ron Paul, Tim Pawlenty, Newt Gingrich, Mitch Daniels, John Thune, Haley Barbour and Rick Santorum.

The BBC's Katie Connolly, meanwhile, assesses the chances each has of winning the nomination.

The contest will step up a gear with the Iowa straw poll in August, while the first state-by-state primary elections and caucuses are due in February 2012.