Goobergunch Political Report

After the messy tie that was the Iowa Caucuses, state Republican Party chairman Matt Strawn announced his retirement. His replacement was selected today:

Ames Republican A.J. Spiker is the new chairman of the Republican Party of Iowa.

Spiker is a real estate agent and state GOP central committee member. He’s well known for his strong backing of presidential candidate Ron Paul.

Spiker is Paul’s first automatic delegate, and his ninth overall—although I wouldn’t be surprised if Paul got a few delegates from the caucus states that have held first-round caucuses but haven’t formally allocated their national delegates yet.

UPDATE [21:23 CST]: I’ve seen a couple claims that the following tweet means that Spiker shouldn’t be counted for Paul:

New R chair @AJSpiker says he resigned as co-chair of Ron Paul IA camp, will support whomever R nominee is.

However, that’s really just telling us that (1) Spiker isn’t actively working for the Paul campaign and (2) he’ll support whoever gets nominated, as opposed to a hypothetical third-party Paul bid. It says nothing about who Spiker will support on a hypothetical first ballot in which the nominee is unclear going in, and that’s really the scenario that the delegate count is most interested in. Obviously, if (as has been the case since 1976) there’s a clear Republican nominee when the convention starts, the projected delegate count here will be wildly inaccurate since most delegates will switch to whoever the expected nominee is.

A bit old, but still:

[Illinois Republican Party Chairman Pat] Brady said he is supporting the former Massachusetts governor as, Brady believes, the best choice to oust President Obama.

Incidentally, while it’s true that Minnesota and Colorado didn’t directly select any delegates on Tuesday, 70 delegates will still be selected as a result of the process that began on Tuesday night. Mitt Romney’s inability to perform in those states may very well hurt him when it comes time for those states’ delegates to actually be selected. For reference, there are a total of 371 delegates selected by state party via a system that does not directly allocate delegates at the initial selection stage.

First, a press release announcing Romney’s Wyoming leadership team lists Greg Schaefer, Wyoming Republican National Committeeman, as a state co-chair.

Second:

Constitutional scholar and [Indiana] Republican National Committee member James Bopp, Jr. wrote an open letter expressing his support of Mitt Romney….

As neither the Colorado nor Minnesota caucuses tonight allocate delegates directly, I won’t be tallying the results. (They’re similar to Iowa. The caucuses impact the eventual delegate selection, but the exact allocation can’t be accurately calculated yet.) The actual delegate selection in Colorado and Minnesota won’t be for a few more months.

I have to say that the Gingrich campaign is doing a horrible job of actually announcing endorsements. It makes keeping track of delegates rather annoying. However, via twitter:

Endorsed Newt for Prez today and introduced JC Watts at Gingrich rally in E.P. taxpayerwatchdog.org.

— Jeff Johnson (@Jeff_Johnson_MN) February 3, 2012

Jeff Johnson is the Republican National Committeeman for Minnesota, and accordingly, an automatic convention delegate.

This one slipped through the cracks earlier:

Before Gingrich arrived at the center, Puerto Rican men in suits roamed the sparsely populated sanctuary and women wearing their Sunday Best gently fanned themselves with signs that read, “Don’t believe the liberal media,” while Chris Tomlin classics ”Better Is One Day” and “We Cry Holy” trickled out of the PA system. The crowd came alive as Don Carlos Méndez, mayor of Aguadilla City, Puerto Rico, took the stage to introduce Gingrich.

Méndez is also the chair of the Puerto Rico Republican Party, and as such an automatic delegate.

Via press release:

Mitt Romney today announced the support of Puerto Rico Governor Luis G. Fortuño.

Republicans aren’t Democrats, so a gubernatorial endorsement isn’t usually an automatic delegate. However, Fortuño is also the Republican National Committeeman for Puerto Rico, and so he alone of all governors has an automatic ticket to the convention.