Republican race heads into Kansas
The battle for the Republican party crown heads into new territory with the “reddest of the red” states Kansas next to vote as Rick Santorum seeks to hobble Mitt Romney’s slow march forward.
In normal times, Saturday’s caucuses in midwestern Kansas would merit merely a passing mention, but with no clear Republican candidate yet to take on Democrat President Barack Obama in November elections, all is still to play for.
“We’re very much on the candidates’ radar because Super Tuesday has come and gone and we still don’t know who our nominee is,” said Lora Cox, executive director of the Sedgwick County Republican Party.
“We are definitely the heartland for conservative thought,” Cox said.
Ultraconservative Kansas is an unlikely match for Romney, and the former governor of liberal Massachusetts has stayed away, focusing instead on Tuesday’s primaries in the Alabama and Mississippi.
Although Romney consolidated his pole position in this week’s slew of votes, he failed to knock either Santorum or former House Speaker Newt Gingrich out of the race. Libertarian Texas congressman Ron Paul is also still hanging on, even though he has yet to win a single contest.
No polls have been carried out in Kansas, but most observers believe Santorum’s tough right wing message will win over conservatives — although the race could still be muddled, according to some.
“Among Kansas Republicans, we have the well-known split between polar conservatives and moderates,” said local political blogger Bob Weeks.
“There are many Republicans who are supporting the hardline conservatives, and many that feel more comfortable with an establishment candidate like Mitt Romney.”
So far Romney is leading the pack overall, having won about a third of the 1,144 delegates needed to secure the party’s nomination.
There are 40 delegates at stake in Kansas, and a further 18 split between the far-flung U.S. territories of Guam, Northern Marianas and the Virgin Islands, which also hold votes on Saturday.
The bigger prizes are at stake on Tuesday, when Alabama with 50 delegates, Mississippi with 40 and Hawaii with 20 will go to the polls.
“Santorum’s social conservatism would be expected to play well with Deep Southern voters,” said Charles Franklin, co-founder of pollster.com and a professor at Marquette University Law School.
“But stylistically, Gingrich with his long history in the South maybe is a little more appealing than Santorum’s Yankee charm from Pennsylvania.”