42 are awarded from the
state’s 14 congressional districts, three per district (outright
majority wins all three district delegates, plurality win gets two, with
one for the runner-up)
- March 6: Voters fill out certification cards as others go in to Medlock Bridge Elementary School in Georgia to cast their ballots in the Republican primary, on Super Tuesday.
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Super Tuesday: Can Romney close the deal?
GOP candidate expected to take at least half of the states
• 31 are awarded proportionately based on statewide vote share (20 percent threshold)
• Three are given as a bonus to the state popular vote winner
• Open primary
• Presidential preference only
• 963,541 votes cast in 2008 (Huckabee 34%, McCain 32%, Romney 30%, Paul 3%)
• Polls close 7 pm EST
Full Super Tuesday Georgia coverage >>
Gingrich Seeks Sprawling Victory
Newt Gingrich
represented Georgia’s 6th Congressional district from 1979 to 1999.
When he took office, it was a wide-ranging swath of northwest Georgia,
starting with the Cobb County and Fulton County suburbs of Atlanta.
Georgia and its growing populations have added four congressional
districts since then, mostly dividing the explosion of the Atlanta
suburbs. Gingrich’s old district is now surrounded by new suburban and
exurban districts on either side.
As the Atlanta suburbs
have boomed, especially north of town, so have their significance in the
state’s Republican politics. In 2008, Mike Huckabee
won 80 percent of the state’s delegates with only 34 percent of the
popular vote in large part because of his success in the far outlying
portions of Atlanta and their congressional clout. By tying together the
far suburbs with rural votes, Huckabee cleaned up on delegates four
years ago despite a narrow popular vote victory
Huckabee was also helped by the fact that John McCain and Mitt Romney
were hemming each other in. McCain scored with the large number of
military members around the state, as well as moderate voters in the
coastal counties near Savannah. But Romney kept in close in these
moderate precincts. Similarly, McCain cut into Romney’s lead where he
did best – the most affluent, close-in suburbs of Atlanta.
Gingrich has campaigned so
much in Georgia despite a steady lead in polls because he wants to run
up the score for the sake of delegates. If Gingrich can dominate his old
suburban stomping grounds as well as rural districts around the state
he might do even better than Huckabee did last time, even if Romney does
well with costal moderates and in the wealthiest zip codes of metro
Atlanta.
Remember, 80 percent of Georgia’s delegates would be almost the same size as Ohio’s entire delegation.
The danger for Gingrich,
though, is that if downscale exurban voters, rural evangelicals and
Democrats (of both the sincere social conservative and mischief-making
varieties (watch Clark County, home to the University of Georgia, for
evidence of the latter)) keep it close in the upstate and central
regions, Gingrich could walk away with a popular vote win but an
unimpressive delegate count.
Counties to Watch
Cherokee
This fast-growing exurban
county on Interstate 75/575 north of Atlanta was once part of Gingrich’s
district, but is now in a new Atlanta exurban district. Cherokee has
changed a lot since Gingrich took office 33 years ago. This was
Huckabee’s closest encroachment on Atlanta in 2008, fueled by
evangelical voters and a mindset closer to an industrial park than a
corporate high rise. If Gingrich is winning here, it’s a good sign that
he has tied together rural and suburban precincts.
Chatham
Savannah and Chatham
County should be Romney country, as should be the whole coastal and
islands region. Upscale, more moderate and with a fair number of
northern transplants, Romney should be able to post some numbers here.
If Romney is performing well Chatham, he might also be doing well in the
toniest Atlanta suburbs in northern Fulton and DeKalb counties. That
could be enough to pick up some delegates and, more importantly, narrow
the margins between Gingrich and Santorum, ensuring nobody walks away a
big winner from the former speaker’s former home state.
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