ASHINGTON - After drawing only 1 percent of the Republican vote in Monday's Iowa caucuses, Senator Orrin G. Hatch is expected to announce today he is withdrawing from the presidential race.
Hatch, a four-term Republican senator from Utah, attracted fewer than 900 votes in Iowa, where he spent 48 days campaigning. His campaign is equally troubled in New Hampshire, where polls show him with no more than 2 percent support among GOP voters.
''I think he was a little bit disappointed in the results,'' Hatch's campaign spokeswoman, Margarita Tapia, said yesterday. And while Hatch aides delivered a meek promise that Hatch would continue to campaign in New Hampshire despite the trouncing in Iowa, the conservative standard-bearer is widely believed to be ready to announce today that he will leave the race.
''He was disappointed to say the least. `Devastated' is probably a better word,'' said Kent Cook, scheduler for the Hatch campaign.
Hatch had planned a Washington news conference for yesterday but delayed it until this morning because of the snowy weather in the nation's capital.
Hatch is well-known in Washington and has drawn both ire and accolades as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. But outside the capital, Hatch is virtually unknown.
After a debate in Manchester last month, Hatch showed up at the airport alone, carrying his own bags and eager to chat up anyone hanging around the terminal.
''He got in late. He kind of slipped in without people really knowing who he was,'' said Andy Smith, director of the University of New Hampshire Survey Center, referring to Hatch's late entry into the race last summer.
''He didn't really seem to have any specific reason to be in the race other than that he seemed to feel he was better qualified than the other candidates,'' Smith said.
Hatch is known for his ardent defense of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas during Thomas's confirmation hearings when he was accused of sexually harassing law professor Anita Hill.
But Hatch, a strong conservative, has also surprised some with his left-leaning initiatives. Hatch has teamed up with Senator Edward M. Kennedy on health care bills and has been active in seeking help for AIDS patients. Hatch has even written a song about children with AIDS, with the refrain, ''these are the innocent.''
Hatch's campaign, however, was less focused. While the senator had a few pet issues, particularly what he saw as corruption in the Clinton-Gore administration and the threat that a Democratic president would appoint liberal jurists to the Supreme Court, his campaign mainly centered on the weight of his own experience as a senator.
Hatch's competition also limited his chances of success. Texas Governor George W. Bush gained much of the Republican establishment vote; Senator John McCain of Arizona is popular among Republican centrists, and antiabortion candidates Gary Bauer, Steve Forbes, and Alan Keyes are dividing the conservative Republican vote, noted political analyst Stuart Rothenberg.
''At least Hatch had some credentials - more than half of the people in the race,'' Rothenberg said. But ''there wasn't much left [of the vote] by the time he got in.''
