Posted on 03/03/2012 4:09:17 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
In a potentially ominous Super Tuesday setback for Rick Santorum, a campaign filing mishap in Ohio could leave him ineligible to be awarded 18 Buckeye State district delegates -- more than a quarter of the total at stake there, ABC News reported Friday.
Ohio has 66 delegates total, with 63 at stake on Tuesday. Santorum failed to qualify for any district delegates in three Ohio congressional districts representing nine delegates because he didn't turn in names there.
ABC News reported that in six other congressional districts, the former Pennsylvania senator's campaign submitted fewer names than required to be eligible for all three delegates up for grabs in each district. That would put another nine delegates in jeopardy.
Santorum spokesman Hogan Gidley responded to the report by issuing a statement that sought to depict the issue as a continuation of a controversy in Michigan. Santorum contends he and Mitt Romney should have split the delegates evenly in that state, but party officials there awarded Romney 16 and Santorum 14 in a move that the latter has decried as dirty politics and is contesting.
"The attempt by the establishment to to deceive the voters of Ohio and further their hand-picked candidate will be met with resistance on Tuesday," Gidley said. "I want to be clear -- Rick Santorum's name will appear on every ballot in the state of Ohio, and every vote cast will go towards his at-large delegate allocation.
"As it relates to individual congressional districts, it's clear we aren't the establishment hand-picked candidate, and back in December we were a small effort focused on Iowa. Now that we've won several states, obviously much has changed, and we feel confident that we will do well in both the delegate and popular vote count on Tuesday."
But a Romney spokesman seized on the report as further evidence that Santorum is a vastly inferior candidate.
"Rick Santorum has failed to get on the ballot in Virginia, has failed to file full delegate slates in Tennessee, New Hampshire and Illinois, and has failed to submit enough delegates in several Ohio congressional districts," said the spokesman, Ryan Williams, alluding to other Santorum logistical pitfalls. "The fact that he cannot execute the simple tasks that are required to win the Republican nomination proves that Rick Santorum is incapable of taking on President Obama's formidable political machine."
If he wins in a district where he failed to allocate a full slate of three delegates, Santorum would be eligible to take only the delegates he has already allocated in that district. But the unallocated delegates would not be awarded to anyone else.
"On Super Tuesday, if Sen. Santorum were to carry a district where he has not seated a full delegate slate, he will be awarded delegates where he has submitted delegate names," Ohio Republican Party spokesman Chris Maloney told The Plain Dealer of Cleveland. "And the additional delegates in that district will be unallocated."
Such a situation, The Plain Dealer said, sets up challenges -- if not from Santorum, then from political rivals such as Romney or Newt Gingrich.
The Ohio state party told the newspaper it has not faced this situation before, but it has been reviewing its bylaws and is prepared, if there is a challenge, to convene what it calls a "committee on contests."
Rules is rules, Ricky.
LOL Oh my, and people are actually thinking of voting for this guy. LOL
Voting in America is about as free and clean as voting in Cuba. America is rotting from the decay of evil. I love this Republic and this type of (you fill in the blank) hurts me to the core. We now live in a Banana Republic... or worse.
LLS
The article appears to be a typical attempt to manipulate. Lots of coulds, mays and mights but not a lot of facts.
Keywords are “could be”.
It seems like anywhere they knew it would be shaky for Mitt, all these problems seem to crop up or else the rules get changed.
Yesterday it was reported there were three districts, now there “could be” eighteen.
What a scam.
I bet this would be seen as a terrible outrage around here if it was Newt getting ripped off.
If it is Santorum, it is all his fault.
How do they know that this problem won’t happen in Georgia, just like it did in Florida?
LOL
As I read the Tennessee rules, the party executive committee is free to choose whomever they wish for delegate if there are no Santorum delegates to draw from (which there aren’t)....not sure about Ohio.
I expect the GOP will grant all those states that were punished with the loss of 50% of their delegates (for pushing up the dates of their primary/caucus), to be returned (after they see how the numbers shake out for Mitt) at the convention.
I guess what I am saying is that the rules keep being changed after the fact. It seems the rules are subject to change after the vote is counted.
This is happening way to often to be a coincidence.
This was not such a problem in 2008. It seems to me that the GOP is the party without it’s act put together.
In Indiana, they tried to keep Santorum off the ballot for the same reasons. He is on the ballot now because it was determined that he did have the correct amount of signatures.
I am not thrilled about any of our choices this time, but I don’t think any of them should get ripped off.
see post #11. And you are probably right if it goes to the convention.
I was saying yesterday that this whole thing is set up for Mitt. May be the best thing we will end up with is making Mitt and the GOP shake with rage that Mitt isn’t crowned early.
So they will pull out all the tricks in their bag in these races.
If Mitt is the Republican candidate, I pray a righteous third party candidate will run.
You could substitute any name for Santorum and the whole story would have been repeated. The GOP establishment HAS decided that Romney IS the nominee. The DNC WANTS Romney. The media WANTS Romney. It’s a done deal.
The system has been and is being geared and gamed to make Romney the candidate.
You could substitute any name for Santorum and the whole story would have been repeated. The GOP establishment HAS decided that Romney IS the nominee. The DNC WANTS Romney. The media WANTS Romney. It’s a done deal.
The system has been and is being geared and gamed to make Romney the candidate.
Sometimes I feel like the base is the “mark” in the GOP-elite “Sting.”
Yeah, WHICH districts? I live in Ohio and it would sure be nice to know if one of them is mine.
Here’s another article with more information about the districts.
http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2012/03/rick_santorum_faces_bigger_ohi.html
I am sure there is skulduggery afoot, but you would think that the senior staff of any political campaign knows that their candidate cannot win if they do not fullfill the requirements to be listed on the ballot. Then again, during the early stages of the campaign, Santorum and Newt were marginal candidates at best and really did not have the money, organization, or expectations to have the need to be on the ballot in all primary states.
Remember when McCain was challenging Bush for the nomination and all at once he shut up and backed off?
He was probably promised that 2008 was his turn.
In 2008 Romney was not getting out because he had the money to keep going.
All at once he backed out and supported McCain.
He was probably promised the 2012 nod. Not to mention that the GOP knew Obama or Hillary was going to win in 2008. So they probably told Mitt his chances would also be better in 2012 to win.
Once again. too many coincidences here to think this isn’t a set up.
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