Discord Among Conservatives as Romney Picks Up Steam Rick Santorum's campaign released its first negative advertisement against Mitt Romney hours before a debate of the presidential candidates in Myrtle Beach. MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. - While Republican moderates on Monday moved to rally around Mitt Romney as their presidential nominee, conservatives showed new signs of fracturing, despite a vote over the weekend by religious leaders to coalesce behind Rick Santorum as an anti-Romney alternative. Jon M. Huntsman Jr., the moderate former governor of Utah whose candidacy did not live up to its early promise, dropped out of the race on Monday and endorsed Mr. Romney, saying, "It is now time for our party to unite around the candidate best equipped to defeat Barack Obama." Alluding to his past criticism of Mr. Romney, a onetime governor of Massachusetts, Mr. Huntsman said at a news conference, "Despite our differences and the space between us on some of the issues, I believe that candidate is Governor Mitt Romney." But his call for unity came as evangelical leaders, intent on blocking Mr. Romney's path to the nomination, showed new divisions after appearing on Saturday to have settled on Mr. Santorum as their conservative choice. Four Christian conservative leaders who attended the meeting of evangelicals in Texas asserted their independence from the leadership, issuing a statement on Monday that said, "Many there were and still are for Newt Gingrich." Underscoring the party's lack of unity, Mr. Santorum's campaign released its first negative advertisement against Mr. Romney hours before a debate of the presidential candidates here in Myrtle Beach. The ad called Mr. Romney "more liberal than Ted Kennedy on social issues" and said he had inspired President Obama's health care overhaul. It highlighted how the battle for South Carolina's evangelical and conservative voters - who make up 60 percent of the state's registered Republicans - has boiled down to a two-man contest between Mr. Santorum and Mr. Gingrich. Neither candidate showed any sign that they were considering stepping aside. As Mr. Santorum was trying to build momentum from Saturday's endorsement by the religious leaders, the Gingrich camp sought to burst that bubble, saying that the Santorum team had misrepresented the scope of the evangelicals" vote on Saturday and that it would not matter anyway. Mr. Gingrich told voters at a stop here: "People have to decide if you vote for Senator Santorum, in effect you're functionally voting for Governor Romney, because he's not going to beat him. The only way to stop Governor Romney for all practical purposes is to vote for Newt Gingrich. That's a mathematical fact. But Santorum supporters said the evangelicals" decision would upend the race. "This was a total game-changer," said Bill Wichterman, a senior adviser to the Santorum campaign. "When you're looking at trajectories, there's been a rapid loss of conservative support" for Mr. Gingrich, Mr. Wichterman said, "and a transitioning to Santorum. That's not spin, that's what happened. The squabbling on the conservative end left Mr. Romney as a potential unintended beneficiary, as his opposition remains fractured and he tries to pull off a third straight victory in a nominating contest with Saturday's primary vote here. It remained an open question what the electoral effect - if any - the endorsement from Mr. Huntsman would have in the five-day countdown to the primary. Mr. Romney was leading in most polls here, but with a far less comfortable margin than he had nationally. Mr. Huntsman said the party needed to focus on the goal of defeating President Obama in November and to coalesce behind Mr. Romney. But the primary season ritual of also-ran candidates endorsing rivals with whom they had sparred mightily just days before was on display in all its awkwardness on Monday. Mr. Huntsman hardly waxed poetic about Mr. Romney, whom he had harshly criticized for months, giving him a single sentence five minutes into his speech of nearly nine minutes. Mr. Romney did not publicly acknowledge the endorsement until more than 30 minutes after Mr. Huntsman officially made it. Both men were in Myrtle Beach during the day, and Mr. Huntsman's schedule was decidedly open, but there were no plans to appear together.