From CNN’s Peter Hamby: 

The Perry campaign conducted two “tele-town halls,” dialing into the homes of targeted GOP voters across both states [Iowa and South Carolina] and asking them to hold for the governor, according to a South Carolina Republican source who received one of the calls. Perry was introduced on the South Carolina call by former South Carolina Republican Party Chairman Katon Dawson, Perry’s campaign chairman in the state.

The candidate immediately set about defending his record on three issues that have come to define his campaign in recent weeks: immigration, Social Security, and his 2007 executive order mandating that school girls be vaccinated against the sexually transmitted human papillomavirus (HPV), which can cause cervical cancer.

“He said, ‘You all have heard a lot of things out there, so let me set the record straight,’” said the source who was on the South Carolina call. “I was struck by the fact that he started out on defense instead of offense.”