Newt Gingrich could be facing a win-or-walk-away situation in the Deep South on Tuesday -- and the early numbers are not promising for the trailing presidential candidate, with two new polls showing him behind in Alabama.

The new polls each showed a different leader in the state, neither of them Gingrich. In an Alabama Education Association poll, Mitt Romney was ahead. A survey out of Alabama State University gave the lead to Rick Santorum.

Gingrich's campaign brushed off the results. But they underscore the challenge the former House speaker faces.

His entire campaign strategy rests on big wins in southern states -- the next of which, Alabama and Mississippi, vote Tuesday. Though Gingrich won big in his home state of Georgia on Super Tuesday, that strategy suffered a blow after he also lost Tennessee to Santorum. And if Gingrich loses either Mississippi or Alabama on Tuesday, or both, he could be left with an almost invisible path to the nomination...

Jerry Luquire’s phone rang on Thursday, signaling something that has long eluded the current president of the Georgia Christian Coalition: A political victory.

Luquire, who in the past 35 years has lost three campaigns for public office, had been lobbying legislators to reject Senate Bill 10, which would have allowed counties and cities to let voters decide whether to permit the Sunday sale of alcohol.

When he answered his cell phone Thursday, he learned the bill would not be moving from the Rules Committee to the floor for debate and a vote.

For at least the time being, Georgia would remain one of three states, with Indiana and Connecticut, that doesn’t sell alcohol on Sundays.

“That is good news,” he told the caller. “That is fantastic.”

Suddenly, the 72-year-old Columbus resident finds himself a policy-maker after all.

A controversial law passed in Arizona giving state and local police the right to arrest anyone reasonably suspected of being an illegal immigrant is catching on nationwide, with lawmakers and others in several states considering similar legislation.

Concerned about the federal government's failure to secure the nation's borders, legislators and political candidates from Georgia to Colorado have introduced bills to beef up local immigration enforcement, have promised to do so or said they would support such legislation if offered...

Atlanta (AP) - A judge has ordered Georgia to return $330,000 seized from an assisted suicide group in February.

Forsyth County Superior Court Judge Jeffrey S. Bagley wrote in an order filed Oct. 7 that the money should be returned because the state hadn't filed the necessary complaint in seven months.

Authorities seized the money after four people affiliated with the Final Exit Network, including the group's president and its medical director, were arrested. They were charged with assisted suicide in the June 2008 death of 58-year-old John Celmer, who had suffered from cancer...