POLITICS:

Nevada low on GOP candidates’ lists of priorities

Rick Santorum, Ron Paul, Herman Cain, Mitt Romney, Rick Perry, Newt Gingrich and Michele Bachmann are introduced before the GOP presidential debate sponsored by CNN on Tuesday, Oct. 18, 2011, at the Venetian.

By Anjeanette Damon

Wednesday, Nov. 2, 2011 | 2 a.m.

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The Nevada Republican Party’s decision to shift the date of the presidential caucuses appears to have done little to alter the candidates’ approach here — for the most part they still don’t care about the Silver State.

Out of a field of eight GOP presidential candidates, only four — Mitt Romney, Ron Paul, Herman Cain and Rick Perry — have put any effort into building a campaign organization to win the caucuses, which are a much more labor intensive endeavor for a campaign than a simple primary in which voters cast a ballot.

But even the efforts of those four candidates pale in comparison to the organizations built by the Democratic presidential candidates who competed for the state four years ago. By contrast, Democratic candidates had field offices open throughout the state and an army of paid staff and volunteers recruiting precinct captains and supporters to caucus by midsummer four years ago.

To date, Republican candidates have three field offices and fewer than a dozen staff members in the state.

It’s unclear yet what the ramifications of Nevada moving from third to fifth in the nation will have on the resources the campaigns put into Nevada. The Perry campaign says it simply gives them more time to organize Nevada. The Romney campaign says it changes nothing.

Despite moving from Jan. 14 to Feb. 4, Nevada could still play a decisive role.

If the front-runners split Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida, Nevada could be a vital tiebreaker state. Or the candidates could decide the money and effort to campaign out West won’t be worth it in terms of delegates or momentum.

With just three months to go before the caucuses, here’s a look at how the four candidates who have been working Nevada are organizing:

Photo by Steve Marcus
Mitt Romney

It should be news to few that Romney’s campaign has poured significant resources into restarting the organization it built in Nevada four years ago.

So far, Romney is one of two candidates who have a field office here. He has three paid staffers on the ground and is working closely with Nevada veteran campaign consultant Ryan Erwin — who led Romney’s Nevada efforts four years ago as well.

The camp has largely operated in stealth mode, worried about tipping off any opponents on their organizing strategy.

“We’re organizing all across the state. We are organizing in a variety of different ways,” Erwin said, declining to elaborate.

Traditionally, caucuses are organized around precincts — neighborhood-level political subdivisions — in which a captain is recruited and tasked with identifying a candidate’s supporters and convincing them to spend a Saturday morning at a caucus meeting.

Romney’s camp, however, is building on that simple framework.

“They’re not out pontificating about the size of their organization, but they are meticulously going through and recruiting precinct people,” said one Republican source who is unaffiliated with any of the presidential campaigns. “They are expansive here. It’s just huge.”
Photo by Steve Marcus
Herman Cain

The outsider candidate who has shot to the top of national and Nevada polls has had a team of volunteers in Nevada for months.

Although Cain hasn’t sent a professional campaign staff to Nevada, he has a director who has been cultivating a growing organization.

So far, the camp has constructed a skeleton crew of volunteers, relying heavily on help from the state and county parties.

Although the Republican Party has offered assistance, voter identification data and other help to all of the candidates, only Cain has taken advantage. (Other candidates see it as a strategic mistake to let party insiders in on their organization strategy.)

“They are the only campaign requesting access at a precinct level” to the party’s voter data, one source said.

Cain’s national popularity has driven much of the volunteers’ interest — a popularity that may be blunted by the story broken by Politico that he was the subject of sexual harassment complaints during his time as head of the National Restaurant Association.

But whether his campaign network can capitalize on that in Nevada is still untested.

Cain drew a standing room-only crowd at an event at the Siena retirement community in Las Vegas.

“But were they prepared to sign everybody in and get everybody’s name? No,” said one Republican source. “They missed capturing 300 potential supporters.”
Photo by Leila Navidi
Ron Paul

The fly in the ointment of the Republican caucuses four years ago has been doggedly keeping his campaign network intact since 2008.

And rather than operating as outsiders, Paul’s devoted following has worked to infiltrate the party apparatus, winning seats on central committees and helping to elect the state party chairwoman, Amy Tarkanian.

Paul has opened two field offices, one on both ends of the state, and has a paid campaign professional in Nevada.

“They’ve got a devoted following, they’re recruiting precinct captains but they’re not telling anybody what they’ve got,” one Republican sources said. “They’re holding things much closer to the vest.”
Photo by Leila Navidi
Rick Perry

Very shortly after making his campaign for president official, the Texas governor put Nevada on notice that he would be taking the state seriously.

He snagged the top endorsement from Gov. Brian Sandoval and hired two campaign staffers to begin putting his organization in place.

But in concert with his rather dramatic drop from front-runner status in the early days of his campaign, Perry’s Nevada team has been struggling to line up endorsements and volunteers.

“Perry is desperately trying to find volunteers,” said one Republican source unaffiliated with any of the campaigns. “Everybody thought he could tap into the Sandoval organization, but, and I may be the only one who says it, what organization?”

Sandoval won an overwhelming victory against an unpopular Democrat, but his campaign did not rely heavily on a field organization that could be valuable to a presidential candidate.

That leaves Perry to build his own.

And his campaign stresses that he’s doing just that.

“Nevada is a priority,” Perry spokesman Ray Sullivan said. “It is one of the few states where we have brought on paid staff. We are actively recruiting volunteers and working on opening a full-time campaign headquarters for the state.”