Relevance of Illinois primary could hinge on Super Tuesday
With the state's primary election less than three weeks away, just how much Illinois will be in play in the Republican presidential contest could depend upon Super Tuesday contests.
Mitt Romney's primary victories in Michigan and Arizona on Tuesday might have righted his bid for the GOP nomination, but no candidate will have mathematically sewn it up even after 10 states hold their primaries and caucuses next week.
But the Super Tuesday results could serve as an exit ramp for one or more contenders, with key attention on Ohio, a battleground where Rick Santorum has been leading in polls, and Georgia, the former home of Newt Gingrich.
"It's a battle for delegates," said David Yepsen, a veteran of presidential politics who heads the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University. "Illinois is still going to be a good prize worth going for."
The state's presidential primary traditionally has been a nonfactor nationally because it's held so late. Four years ago, Illinois lawmakers moved the primary date to early February to help Barack Obama win some early delegates from his home state. Illinois also handed eventual 2008 Republican nomineeSen. John McCain an early victory over Romney but got scant attention because it was one of more than 20 states holding contests during Super Tuesday that year.
This time, the delegates at stake in Illinois on March 20 could be valuable to a candidate seeking the nomination or at least securing some influence at the Republican National Convention.
Illinois will have a presidential preference ballot, but as always, it's only a beauty contest. What matters are the 54 presidential nominating delegates that will be directly elected by Republican voters from each of the state's new 18 congressional districts. Romney, Ron Paul and Gingrich each filed full slates of delegates, while Santorum filed only 44 delegate contenders, unable to field candidates in four congressional districts.
In failing to file a full slate, Santorum missed out in Illinois on the opportunity to pick up delegates in the new 5th Congressional District, which includes strong Republican areas in Elmhurst, Oak Brook and Hinsdale, and in the downstate 13th District, which runs through central and southwestern Illinois.
Even before this week's results, representatives of Romney's so-called super PAC, Restore Our Future, made inquiries about purchasing television advertising time in the expensive Chicago market, according to a source familiar with the TV ad market who was not authorized to speak publicly.
Santorum also has a super PAC, but questions have arisen about the former Pennsylvania senator's ability to run the breadth and depth of a national campaign organization. In next week's Virginia primary, Santorum and Gingrich fell short of the state's ballot rules, leaving only Romney and Paul to compete.
This year, a change in the RNC's delegate selection rules has drawn out the GOP presidential campaign.
Unlike previous years, early states were required to award national convention nominating delegates on a proportional basis. Those states that chose winner-take-all contests or moved up earlier in the process in violation of RNC rules found delegates cut in half.
So even after months of campaigning and 11 caucuses and primaries, the front-running Romney has fewer than 200 delegates, or only about one-sixth of those needed to win the nomination.
On Super Tuesday, there are 437 delegates at stake, but even a clean sweep would not allow any of the GOP's final four to amass the 1,144 delegates needed to outright win the nomination. Nor would the 261 delegates up for grabs in the two weeks between Super Tuesday and the Illinois primary.
Illinois might hold a special cachet for competition among the Republican contenders — claiming to win the GOP nomination in Obama's backyard. But by the general election, the state likely will be flyover territory, except for fundraising, for the eventual Republican nominee.
Though the 2008 Democratic nominating battle between Obama and now-Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton also went on for months, Yepsen said there is a tangible difference.
"Democrats were arguing about who they liked better and were having a hard time deciding," said Yepsen, a former national political writer for The Des Moines Register. "A lot of Republicans, they don't like any of them and are having a hard time deciding."
Although expressing optimism about the importance of Illinois, representatives of the campaigns in the state have little to say about their plans for Illinois. Romney, though, is scheduled to be in the state March 19, appearing at a fundraising event in the Peoria area with GOP U.S.Rep. Aaron Schock, and is expected to be in Chicago on primary night.
Not to be outdone, Obama has scheduled a fundraising luncheon March 16 at the Palmer House Hilton in Chicago. The event, hosted by Lawyers for Obama, will cost at least $2,500 per person.