Ron Paul, Still a Candidate, Heads to GOP Convention Showdown - America’s Election HQ

Ron Paul, Still a Candidate, Heads to GOP Convention Showdown - America’s Election HQ

Ron Paul has no chance of winning the Republican presidential nomination this year, but he continues to head toward the party’s National Convention with an ardent group of supporters and a second-phase strategy aimed at raising the profile of his libertarian-leaning issues.
John McCain locked down the delegates he needs to win the nomination two months ago, but Paul continues to be a draw on primary ballots. Just last week in North Carolina, Paul took 7 percent of the vote along with five convention delegates. He similarly won 8 percent of the votes in Indiana, although he didn’t pick up any delegates there.

Paul is nowhere close to McCain in the overall delegate count. According to The Associated Press tally of delegates, the Texas congressman has gathered 19 delegates so far. McCain has 1,413, Mike Huckabee has 286 and Mitt Romney has 260. But unlike Huckabee and Romney, Paul has not withdrawn from the race.

“He remains a candidate,” Paul spokesman Jesse Benton told FOXNews.com on Monday. That means Paul is planning on having as big a delegation as possible at the convention, and he continues to seek a speaking opportunity there, something the party has not offered to him yet.

Benton said a report on the Los Angeles Times’ Web site Monday that Paul planned “to stage an embarrassing public revolt” against McCain was “speculation.”

He said the Paul campaign is only seeking a “positive” effort to bring about reform to the Republican Party, including what Paul believes should be more limited government, including no Internal Revenue Service and no Federal Reserve.
But the Paul campaign’s state-by-state plans have caused some headaches among party officials, who chafe — and at the same time scratch their heads in wonder — at his supporters’ tactics.

The Nevada GOP got a taste of Paul’s supporters’ plans on April 26, when some 600 party delegates backing the congressman flooded the state convention, overwhelmed McCain’s supporters — who didn’t expect a fight — changed a rule, and proceeded to start electing a slate of Paul backers to head to Minneapolis-St. Paul in September.

Nevada GOP officials said the unexpected uprising at the usually orderly state convention caused enough confusion that they ran out of time at the convention hall and had to call a recess. The recess will remain in effect until the party can find another convention hall, said Nevada GOP Executive Director Zac Moyle.

Paul supporters cried foul, and for about a week after the blow-up, Moyle said the party headquarters received several threats — including death threats — from people clearly opposed to McCain. Though the threats were apparently, if not explicitly, from Paul supporters, Moyle said he does not believe the threats were sanctioned by the Paul campaign.

The threats included, “‘You’re gonna die,’ and, ‘You’ll pay,’ and things of that nature. … ‘You guys are gonna rot in hell. … All your typical bargain-bin variety of insults,” Moyle said.

“We did receive a ton of threats. … They’ve subsided now,” Moyle said.

Benton said Republicans should be proud of the interest that was tapped into Nevada. “Those were Nevada state GOP activists that were attending their convention. The Paul campaign has been very encouraging of our supporters, … ” Benton said. “This should be viewed I think very positively by Republicans. … This is about being positive. This is about making our party stronger and holding our party to principles that it has stood for so long.”

Dismissing the idea the Paul campaign was trying to embarrass McCain or run a revolt at the convention, Benton said, “This isn’t about any beef with Senator McCain. There’s respect there.”

Paul’s supporters are continuing to organize for upcoming contests, including in Georgia, Washington state and Minnesota, where Paul will be trying to cobble together as much support as he can. The Nevada strategy might not work, however, if McCain’s supporters show up in full strength.

“We are encouraging all elected delegates to attend the convention in Spokane. The will of the majority will prevail,” Washington state GOP spokesman Patrick Bell said in an e-mailed response to a question about the Paul strategy.

Benton said it’s unlikely Paul will support McCain, pointing primarily to their wide differences over the Iraq war. Paul believes the United States should pull out immediately; McCain says a precipitous troop withdrawal would be defeatist.

But “just because there’s no endorsement doesn’t mean that there is any animosity,” Benton noted.

Benton said Paul will use whatever support he can garner at the National Convention to push for adoption of his monetary policy goal to reintroduce gold and silver as an alternative to the dollar. Benton said Paul believes it would stabilize the country’s monetary unit, which has been in a steady decline against the euro. Benton said Paul has no plans to oppose any of McCain’s platform positions.

Addressing another development — former Georgia Sen. Bob Barr’s announcement Monday that he will run for president as a Libertarian Party candidate — Benton said, “That doesn’t factor into our plans in any way.”