OUT: Jon Huntsman to Drop Out of Race, Endorse Romney!

Jon Huntsman is planning an 11 am ET announcement in which he will drop out and endorse Mitt Romney, Politico reports: A source said that Huntsman's rationale for backing Romney, who he has criticized for weeks on the campaign trail as lacking a "core," is that he didn't want to block the person best prepared in the field to beat Obama, and then to lead the country and grapple with the economy.

"Jon Huntsman is proud of the campaign he ran and the message of restoring trust in Washington," said a campaign official familiar with his thinking. "He didn't want to stand in the way of the candidate most likely to beat Barack Obama and turn the economy around. That's Mitt Romney."

A source close to the campaign said some of Huntsman's advisers attempted to talk him out of the decision, urging the former ambassador to at least wait until after the South Carolina primary this Saturday. It was just today that he got the endorsement of The State, South Carolina's largest newspaper.

"It was entirely a family decision," said the source.