Battle for Delegates: Romney vs. Santorum vs. Gingrich vs. Paul

[Evo]

As of today, here is how the known delegates have been dealt out. Of course there are more delegates to be had, so I though it might be interesting to watch. We can post thoughts and updates.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0312/74002.html

In descending order

Romney - 495 Before Tuesday - 454

Santorum - 252 Before Tuesday - 217

Gingrich - 131 Before Tuesday - 107

Also running - Paul - 48 Before Tuesday - 47

In an article yesterday

On Tuesday, 116 delegates are up for grabs—including 49 in Alabama, 38 in Mississippi, 20 in Hawaii and 9 in American Samoa. But none of the states are "winner take all"—which means there is little opportunity for Santorum or Gingrich to make big gains on Romney as long as the front-runner finishes a close second or third place.

According to a tally by the Associated Press, Romney currently has more than twice as many delegates as Santorum—454 vs. 217. Newt Gingrich has just 107 delegates, while Ron Paul has 47 delegates. To win the nomination, a candidate has to win 1,144 delegates.

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/...ma-primaries-maintain-delegate-104949201.html

 

[jduster]

Just some points to make.

1. Gingrich, while complaining that moderate Republicans feel obligated to inevitably support Romney, Gingrich has a high self-entitlement to be anti-Romney, when the people have already chosen Santorum to be anti-Romney.

2. Gingrich is not quitting because its in his nature to be persistent, but he is only making an embarassment of himself and impeding his party.

3. Ron Paul has no chance of winning. His campaign is largely stagnant, and he avoids half of the states.

4. Romney is the only candidate able to win the nomination. Sure, it's easy to knock off Romney from his frontrunner status for a day or two, but becoming that frontrunner for more than one day is a big difference.

5. Romney has a national campaign whereas the other candidates are only able to strategically win a few important states. But overall, in all states, Romney outcampaigns them all.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

I expect Romney to have the requisite number of delegates going into the convention to gain the nomination on the first ballot.

The territories of Guam, US Virgin Islands, Northern Mariana Islands, and American Samoa send 9 delegates each to the Republican convention. Together, they account for 36 delegates, less than Minnesota with 37. With all due respect, it should be less than Minnesota. After all, 48,916 voters participated in Minnesota's primary while the total number of voters in these 4 territories was 1517. In American Samoa, there were 70 voters for 9 delegates. Of these 36 delegates, Romney gets 34, Paul gets 1 and 1 is uncommitted. I think the lot of them should be committed. Don't forget, territories don't vote in the general election. With arithmetic like that, 4 years from now we may see a Democrat win the Republican nomination.

 

[jduster]

Romney's win in the islands prove my points.

Gingrich and Santorum do not have a strong enough organization and resources to campaign everywhere, but only in a handful of strategic states. Everywhere else, they can't compete. That's why Romney won the islands.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

Romney's win in the islands prove my points.

Gingrich and Santorum do not have a strong enough organization and resources to campaign everywhere, but only in a handful of strategic states. Everywhere else, they can't compete. That's why Romney won the islands.

It's not clear to me what organization any of the candidates had in the territories. Matt Romney, son of one of the candidates, was actually in the Northern Marianas Islands campaigning for his father. On the other hand, Elizabeth Santorum, daughter of a different candidate was in Guam campaigning for her father.

 

[Office_Shredder]

The delegate counts are only estimates at best. The caucuses don't result in bound delegates necessarily, and are often just straw polls. One example is Maine where each caucus meeting has two parts - voting for candidates, and selecting delegates. Ron Paul says that his campaign is the only one that understands the delegate procedure, resulting in a lot of people voting in the straw poll but not actually sticking around to have a say in who is a delegate. Sometimes this is legitimate (e.g. just proposing a re-ordering of what is done when so people can just vote and leave without picking delegates) sometimes less so, for example

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/mar/10/pauls-georgia-partisans-grab-gingrich-turf/

This can have two effects:

1) if delegates aren't bound they can vote for whoever they want at the convention regardless of what the voting says

2) if delegates are bound they're typically only bound for a finite number of votes (for example in the article above it says Georgian delegates are bound for three votes). So if the convention is brokered after a couple of votes Paul might be getting a lot more votes than previously.

 

[Evo]

As of march 18th

In descending order

Romney - 516 Previous 495

Santorum - 236 Previous 252

Gingrich - 141 Previous 131

Also running - Paul - 66 Previous 48

Seems Santorum has gone down. Of course some delegates are up for grabs.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/republican_delegate_count.html

Ron Paul should just drop out. Anything short of all of the other contenders dying, he has no chance. Of course he doesn't care, it's not his money. IMO to all. I'd rather see Paul than Santorum, since neither have a chance of the Presidency, Paul is a tad less scary, IMO.

 

[Gokul43201]

Paul has only half the delegates that Gingrich has, so Paul should drop out. But Gingrich has only half the delegates that Santorum has, so Gingrich should drop out too. And Santorum has only about half the delegates as Romney ...

Right now, I think Romney will finish the primaries with close to 1000 delegates, and things will have to be settled at the Convention. If Gingrich drops out, however, and some part (even a lesser portion) of his delegates switch to Romney, this might be Romney's best bet for an outright win. In other words, if Santorum is to have a hope of winning this, he needs Gingrich to stick it out till the end.

 

[Evo]

Paul has only half the delegates that Gingrich has, so Paul should drop out. But Gingrich has only half the delegates that Santorum has, so Gingrich should drop out too. And Santorum has only about half the delegates as Romney ...

Right now, I think Romney will finish the primaries with close to 1000 delegates, and things will have to be settled at the Convention. If Gingrich drops out, however, and some part (even a lesser portion) of his delegates switch to Romney, this might be Romney's best bet for an outright win. In other words, if Santorum is to have a hope of winning this, he needs Gingrich to stick it out till the end.

It will be interesting.

 

[Evo]

Romney won Illinois and Santorum wasn't eligible because he didn't file proper paperwork.

 

[BobG]

Romney won Illinois and Santorum wasn't eligible because he didn't file proper paperwork.

Actually, Santorum wasn't eligible in every district. There were a total of 54 delegates up for grabs, but Santorum was only eligible to earn 44 of those.

 

[turbo]

Mittens has some problems. He doesn't resonate well with the GOP and he can't capture the base, IMO. He was governor of a very liberal state, and although he was supposedly a Republican, his attitude and positions were very far to left of the national GOP. I think that he will still pick up delegates in the primaries, but he may have a lot of trouble getting support in the general election unless there are compelling races down-ticket. That's quite backward from the norm, but that's how I see it.

 

[Evo]

In descending order after Illinois yesterday.

Romney - 560 Previous 516

Santorum - 246 Previous 236

Gingrich - 141 Previous 131

Also running - Paul - 66 Previous 48

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/republican_delegate_count.html

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

It becomes clearer with each passing day that Romney is going to win the nomination on the first ballot. However, Santorum is sticking to his strategy of reaching beyond his base of conservative supporters to include reactionaries. Gingrich's plan is to build on his sweep of the Eastern half of the middle portion of the southern states. A quick look at the political map shows that he has his opponents cornered. Paul is going to overcome his weakness in the open elections by leveraging his weakness in the caucuses. He's not doing that well in the Urals either. The latest poll shows Romney comfortably ahead in Wisconsin where until recently he was comfortably behind. He is also ahead in DC where polls indicate that Santorum isn't even on the ballot. The other primary coming up April 3rd is in Maryland and I can't find polling information. And just this morning a poll showed Santorum struggling in Pennsylvania, the Alabama of the north.

 

[Gokul43201]

It becomes clearer with each passing day that Romney is going to win the nomination on the first ballot.

Agreed. My earlier estimate was that Romney would finish close to 1000, but now I think he could get over 1300, even if none of the other candidates drop out.

 

[Vanadium 50]

Some arithmetic: there are 2286 delegates. 123 of them are "party leaders", and if one accepts the conventional wisdom that Gov. Romney is the establishment choice, this will break heavily for Romney - say 80-20.

Of the remaining 2163, 1028 have been assigned, leaving 1135. Of that 1135, Gov. Romney needs something like 481 - or 42% - to make it on the 1st ballot. Thus far, he's been at 55%. So we're talking 13% worse than he's done thus far.

 

[Gokul43201]

Thus far, he's been at 55%.

And we've got big states like NY, NJ, CA all expected to go to Romney (TX may be the only big state that doesn't). And WI, a winner-take-all state of 40-odd delegates is polling strongly in Romney's favor . And independent of the demographics of upcoming contests, Romney might be expected to do better than his current 55% just from the inevitability factor starting to take hold as he gets closer to the finish line.

 

[Vanadium 50]

The new numbers are that Gov. Romney needs 39% of the remaining delegates, and has been getting 57% thus far. So the 13% fall becomes 18% now.

Put another way, Sen. Santorum needs 81% of the remaining delegates to win on the 1st ballot.

 

[Tosh5457]

Ron Paul should just drop out. Anything short of all of the other contenders dying, he has no chance. Of course he doesn't care, it's not his money. IMO to all. I'd rather see Paul than Santorum, since neither have a chance of the Presidency, Paul is a tad less scary, IMO.

I've seen from many of your posts that you really hate Ron Paul for some reason. Gingrich should drop out too, do you think he has a chance?

 

[jduster]

For simplicity sake, I assumed Romney would win all of the western states and the north-eastern states. I assumed Santorum would win the southern states, as well as Middle America.

I looked at the delegate counts and did the math.

Mitt Romney will get 1144 (excess of 28) delegates, but it will take him all the way to the last primary in June to do that. Santorum will get a huge boost in May, and reach up to 777 delegates.

Essentially, Santorum has a very slim chance of winning, but can effectively slow down Mitt Romney.

 

[jduster]

I've seen from many of your posts that you really hate Ron Paul for some reason. Gingrich should drop out too, do you think he has a chance?

Neither have a chance. Both should drop.

 

[Gokul43201]

Mitt Romney will get 1144 (excess of 28) delegates, but it will take him all the way to the last primary in June to do that. Santorum will get a huge boost in May, and reach up to 777 delegates.

Did you take into account the different rules applied to different states' primaries? For instance, Texas' 155 delegates are awarded proportionally, while California's 170 delegates ALL go to the winner.

 

[Evo]

Here is today's tally.

Romney - 652

Santorum - 269

Gingrich - 140

Also running - Paul - 67

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/republican_delegate_count.html

 

[turbo]

Here is today's tally.

Romney - 652

Santorum - 269

Gingrich - 140

Also running - Paul - 67

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/republican_delegate_count.html

That pretty much wraps things up, IMO. I wonder if Mittens is stupid enough to follow Palin's advice and "go rogue" in his VP choice... I can't see him picking any of his primary adversaries.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

I'm pretty sure that California's system is winner take all on a congressional district level, not state-wide. However, I haven't been able to find a definitive answer to that in my google searches. Perhaps someone can do better than I.

There are a number of places that do not have electoral college votes and yet do have delegates to the Republican convention. I don't know what the logic for that is, but there are two facts concerning this practice that I point out.

1. They get an enormous number of delegates for their size.
Guam - 9
Northern Marianas Islands - 9
American Virgin Islands - 7
American Samoa - 9
Puerto Rico - 23
Washington D.C - 19
Total count 76, 3.3% of the total 2286 delegates. According to the 2010 census, they comprise 4.7 million people out of 308 million total population or approx 1.5%

2. Romney got almost all of the delegates.
Romney - 74
Gingrich - 1
Unallocated - 1

 

[Evo]

I'm pretty sure that California's system is winner take all on a congressional district level, not state-wide. However, I haven't been able to find a definitive answer to that in my google searches. Perhaps someone can do better than I.

Sigh, no one reads my posts, it's by district.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/republican_delegate_count.html

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

Sigh, no one reads my posts

Sorry. But don't be so hard on the others. I think I'm the only one.

 

[Evo]

Sorry. But don't be so hard on the others. I think I'm the only one.

 

[Gokul43201]

I'm pretty sure that California's system is winner take all on a congressional district level, not state-wide.

Oops! Okay, that changes my prediction by about 50 delegates.

 

[jduster]

I did the math.

For simplicity sake: Romney wins the west, the northeast. Santorum wins the south and middle America.

Santorum will get 777 delegates at most.

Romney gets 1162 delegates (28 above the needed minimum) BUT it would take him to every single state and he would not win until the final state, Utah has had its primary.

Santorum won't win, but he will be successful in dragging out the process to June.

TLDR: Romney will narrowly avoid a brokered convention.

 

[Gokul43201]

I did the math.

For simplicity sake: Romney wins the west, the northeast. Santorum wins the south and middle America.

Not sure what you mean by "wins". Are you splitting the states' delegates by some projection of the results or are you giving all of a state's delegates to the winner? For instance, how many delegates are you giving to Santorum from Texas? All, nearly all, more than half, or about a third?

Recent polling from TX has Romney essentially neck-to-neck with Santorum, each of them getting about a third of the delegates.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/tx/texas_republican_presidential_primary-1598.html

 

[Office_Shredder]

Here's somebody who seems to have done some real work in figuring this out (in particular knowing all the rules for delegate allocation)

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2012/04/the-delegate-predictor-is-it-over.html

 

[Gokul43201]

Here's somebody who seems to have done some real work in figuring this out (in particular knowing all the rules for delegate allocation)

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2012/04/the-delegate-predictor-is-it-over.html

Nice. So their estimate puts Romney over 1400 when all delegates are pledged and counted. That's a lot higher than my somewhat conservative guess of 1250 from a few days ago.