Newt Gingrich’s California Factor

abc ^ | Feb 17, 2012 3:08am | Elicia Dover

[Red Steel]

LOS ANGELES – When Newt Gingrich announced he would be spending the majority of the week in California it was assumed the candidate, who is low on funds, was heading west to collect money.

While Gingrich’s California political director said fundraising this week likely pushed the campaign to its $2 million goal in the state since the beginning of the campaign, there is another strategy is in the works to rack up votes as the state awards proportional delegates for the first time.

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Gingrich has long said he’s in the race until the convention, even saying Thursday his goal was “to go to Tampa.”

California awards 172 delegates, and was a winner-take-all state in previous Republican presidential primary elections. This election cycle the state will award proportional delegates for the first time, and delegates are bound based on a win in one of the 53 congressional districts. Each district awards three delegates, and an additional 10 at-large delegates are bound to the state-wide winner.

“If you win a couple of congressional districts, you get can get as many as you would have gotten in New Hampshire just out of two congressional delegates,” Schroeder said. “So everything’s going to change in terms of how California’s campaigned to. We’ll be campaigned to like we’re several different states.”

-snip-

“Most of them are either Asian, African American or Hispanic. And so you’re going to see for the first time presidential candidates aggressively campaigning to Asians, blacks and Hispanics in California, because they can win significant numbers of delegates,” Schroeder said.

-snip-

Gingrich said today his trip to California was a success

-snip-

“I hope to leave with affection, votes, fond memories and money, all of those things coming together,” Gingrich said.

Gingrich heads back to California on Feb. 25

[RBStealth]

California delegate rich but electorally college poor for Republicans.

[hinckley buzzard]

I understand Newt's superpac has been replenished. This is good news for the party, and ultimately for the Nation. The contours of the democrat hate offensive against Santorum are now clear, and it is equally clear that Little Ricky is totally unprepared to deal with it. America will be needing Newt as never before. In a few weeks that will be unmistakeably clear.

[hoosiermama]

It is good news. Plus the two million from CA which was the campaigns target amount.

I agree with your post one hundred percent.

Have related it to going into an ice cream store. Tasting all the samples, then ordering a double dip of an old favorite.

[cookcounty]

"I understand Newt's superpac has been replenished. "

It's too bad SuperPac money can ONLY be spent on negative campaigning (Not allowed to actually advocate for a named candidate).

I wonder if SuperPacs could get away with advocating positions that the candidate has spoken clearly about? For a strong example, what if Cain were still in and a SuperPac was going on endlessly about how wonderful "9-9-9" is without ever actually mentioning Herman Cain by name. Would that be legal?

[Hugin]

California doesn't have an open primary, so it doesn't matter what the politics of the district as a whole are. All that matters is what the politics of the registered Republicans are in that district, no matter how few they may be. It's a mistake to believe that Pubs in a liberal area are necessarily less conservative than Pubs in a “safe” Republican district. They opposite could be true, and there are a lot fewer of them to woo for the same 3 delegates.

[Hugin]

There are certainly ways around it. I’m seeing ads from the Chamber of Commerce talking about how regulation kills jobs, then showing Rep. Dan Lungren(R) and saying “Fortunately Dan Lungren supports eliminating job killing regulation. Call Congressman Lungren, and tell him to keep fighting to help business create new jobs”.

The reason these PACS are running almost all negative ads is because they work.