Thousands of radical conservatives crowded on to the steps of the Capitol yesterday to voice their anger over Democrat spending plans and yearning for the presence of the one person they really wished was there, but wasn’t: Sarah Palin.

The former Governor of Alaska has emerged from Tuesday’s off-year elections as a front runner for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination and the embodiment of grassroots social conservatism in most of the “lower 48” states, as well as her own.

The trouble for her supporters is that, for the time being, she is available only as a disembodied presence on her Facebook page. “I wish she was in the White House, then we wouldn’t have to be fighting for our freedoms the way we are now,” said Cyntha Paugh, who had travelled from Texas.

Mrs Palin’s online message for the Tea Party movement that would like to endorse her for a White House attempt was an exhortation borrowed from Ronald Reagan: “The cause goes on . . . Recognise that there are millions and millions of Americans out there that want what you want.”

There were certainly many in Washington yesterday who want her to run. “She’s going to be the next President,” Karen Weeks, of New Jersey, said. “Whatever knowledge she doesn’t have, she’d pick it up in a second.”

Mrs Palin came third in a Gallup survey of potential Republican contenders conducted after Tuesday’s elections, but her high approval ratings made her one of two front runners for the nomination, according to Gallup.

The other contender was Mike Huckabee, who now hosts a talk show.

With the next presidential election a mere three years away, the manoeuvring to decide who will face President Obama in 2012 began in earnest on Wednesday — and Mrs Palin will have virtually unlimited opportunities to promote her political brand in the next few weeks. Despite a disastrous performance in her first major network TV interview last year, she has agreed to an extended grilling by the doyenne of American interviewers, ABC’s Barbara Walters, to mark the launch of her book later this month about the 2008 campaign.

The interview will be broadcast in five parts over three days while Mrs Palin launches a nationwide book tour on a campaign-style battle bus. “I hope to cover as much of the country as I can,” she said on Facebook.

The prospect of a Palin presidency is deeply worrying for many in the Republican establishment. She represents a passionate conservative constituency — against big government, abortion and gay rights — that mainstream Republicans must court to win funding and primary contests, but must then keep at arm’s length to be electable among the independents on whom most big races depend.

Her potential to wreck moderate candidacies and split her party has been on show since Tuesday night. Her e-mailed endorsement of Doug Hoffman, the most right-wing candidate in a New York congressional election, catapulted him into a poll lead among conservatives. That led to the withdrawal of the mainstream Republican candidate, a split conservative vote and the first Democratic win in the district since the Civil War. Since then even the whisper of a Palin endorsement has been enough to trigger nervous gaffes by establishment Republicans.

The Tea Party movement’s current target is Carly Fiorina, the former chief executive of Hewlett-Packard. She ended months of speculation on Wednesday by formally declaring a run for the California Senate seat held by Barbara Boxer, a darling of San Francisco Democrats. If activists can persuade Mrs Palin to endorse a right-wing challenger to Ms Fiorina, the effect on her political career would probably be terminal.

At least 65 per cent of Republicans would consider voting for Mrs Palin as a presidential candidate, Gallup found. At this stage Democrats welcome her presence: overall, only 31 per cent of voters would consider backing her, against 57 per cent for Mr Obama.

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