Romney tightens his grip on nomination
After his big win on Super Tuesday, it will be tough for Santorum and Gingrich to catch up
WASHINGTON — Mitt Romney may be winning ugly, but he’s still winning.
And if that’s as good as it gets — if Republican voters never embrace him with anything more than a lukewarm shrug — the Republican presidential front- runner seems happy to accept it.
“I feel pretty darn good,” Romney professed Wednesday, after winning six of 10 states during the Republican’s Super Tuesday presidential sweepstakes. “We’re getting the kind of support across the party that I need to become the nominee.”
By winning on Super Tuesday in Ohio, Massachusetts, Vermont, Virginia, Alaska and Idaho, Romney won more than half of the available delegates and tightened what had been a weak grip on the Republican nomination.
According to an unofficial count by The Associated Press, Romney emerged from Super Tuesday with 415 of the 1,144 delegates he needs to clinch the Republican nomination at the Republican national convention in August. Former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum, Romney’s closest rival, has 176 delegates. Newt Gingrich, the former U. S. House Speaker, has 105 and Texas congressman Ron Paul has 47.
Armed with those delegate tallies, Romney’s campaign issued a memo to reporters on Wednesday arguing, essentially, that further resistance by Santorum and Gingrich was futile.
“Super Tuesday dramatically reduced the likelihood that any of Gov. Romney’s opponents can obtain the Republican nomination,” wrote Rich Beeson, a senior Romney aide.
Not only did Santorum and Gingrich fail to draw closer to Romney in delegates, the upcoming Republican primary calendar offers fewer opportunities to do so, Beeson says.
Until the end of March, Republican delegates will be awarded on a proportional basis — meaning Romney can still add to his tally even if he loses. Starting in April, delegates will be awarded on a winnertake- all basis — enhancing the impact of any further Romney wins.
“As Gov. Romney’s opponents attempt to ignore the basic principles of math, the only person’s odds of winning they are increasing are President [ Barack] Obama’s,” Beeson wrote.
But even with the delegate math in Romney’s favour, Santorum’s three victories on Super Tuesday and Romney’s razor- thin win in Ohio ( which split the delegates) virtually assure the Republican race will extend well into April.
Indeed, the former Massachusetts governor may have to wait awhile for another victory.
The next three major contests — in Kansas, Alabama and Mississippi — are hotbeds of Tea Party activists and evangelical Republicans who have been least enthusiastic about Romney’s candidacy.
Gingrich’s southern strength in Georgia, which he won on Super Tuesday, and South Carolina suggest he will be competitive in both Alabama and Mississippi.
Santorum, meantime, has plans to spend at least $ 1 million on advertising in all three upcoming state contests.
The former Pennsylvania senator’s supporters on Wednesday issued an appeal for Gingrich to drop out of the race in a bid to unite conservatives against Romney.
“Newt has become a hindrance to a conservative alternative,” said Stuart Roy, a spokesman with the Red, White and Blue Fund, Santorum’s arm’s- length super PAC.
Santorum would have won both Ohio and Michigan, which held its primary Feb. 28, had Gingrich not been on the ballot, Roy argued.
“With Gingrich exiting the race it would be a true headtohead race and conservatives would be able to make a choice between a consistent conservative in Rick Santorum or Mitt Romney.”
Gingrich insists he has no plan to suspend his campaign.
“If I thought [ Santorum] was a slam dunk to beat Romney and to beat Obama, I would really consider getting out,” he said in a radio appearance Wednesday. “I don’t.”
Romney’s weaknesses as the Republican front- runner were almost more apparent on Super Tuesday than his strengths, especially in Ohio.
His narrow victory over Santorum, a financially and organizationally outmatched opponent, in a Rust Belt swing state underscored his middling appeal to non- college white voters.
The questions about Romney’s appeal to conservatives are numerous enough that former Alaska governor Sarah Palin, in an interview with CNN, said she’d be willing to step forward as a candidate if the nomination wasn’t decided before the Republican convention in Tampa.
“Anything is possible. I don’t close any doors that perhaps would be open out there,” Palin said.
Romney, for his part, on Wednesday sought to scuttle further talk of a late- entering white knight candidate or a brokered Republican convention.
“We’ve got time, the resources and a plan to get all the delegates, and we think that will get done before the convention,” Romney told CNBC.
“There’s not going to be a brokered convention where some new person comes in and becomes the nominee.”
If there was a clear loser on Super Tuesday, it was Paul. The libertarian congressman failed to carry any of the three small states he targeted — Alaska, North Dakota and Idaho — and remains winless in the Republican primaries and caucuses.