Jan 5, 2008 6:00 pm US/Eastern
Romney Wins Wyoming Caucuses
CASPER, Wyo. (CBS News) ―
With several counties still reporting, Mitt Romney has won the largest number of national delegates elected at today's Wyoming caucuses.
With eight of the 12 county units decided so far, the former Massachusetts governor has won 6 delegates, and Rep. Duncan Hunter and former Senator Fred Thompsn have each won one.
These are the first delegates actually elected to the 2008 Republican National Convention (the Iowa GOP delegates won't be named until the state party's convention in June).
The Wyoming caucuses are conventions of precinct representatives, so the actual number voting is very small - on one county unit, there were just 31 people.
Today's primary was a result of a move by the state's Republican Party to weigh in early in the selection of a presidential nominee, shifting the date of the vote two months earlier than originally scheduled.
Coming two days after the Iowa caucuses and three days before the New Hampshire primary, the early date of the Wyoming GOP county conventions was intended to draw candidates' attention to Wyoming, but has had only modest results.
Republican hopefuls Romney, Thompson, Hunter, and Rep. Ron Paul all stopped by the state - visits they probably wouldn't have made except for this year's early conventions - and candidates have sent Wyoming's GOP voters a flood of campaign mail.
However, the traditional leadoff nomination contests in Iowa and New Hampshire have dominated the attention of both candidates and the national media in recent months, and no candidates have visited Wyoming in the month leading up to the caucuses. State GOP officials have acknowledged that they don't expect Wyoming's contest to have any real impact on which candidate wins the nomination.
Tom Sansonetti, the county convention organizer, maintained Saturday that moving the state's caucuses ahead was the right thing to do.
"The ultimate goal is not how many times we appear on Katie Couric," Sansonetti said. "The ultimate goal was to have attention paid to rank and file Republicans by national candidates."
In addition, he said more Wyoming Republicans have become involved in the process.
Wyoming Republicans also paid a price for jumping ahead. The Republican National Committee has suspended half of Wyoming's 28 national convention delegates. National party leaders similarly penalized Florida, Michigan, New Hampshire and South Carolina for moving up the dates of their nomination contests.
RNC rules require the punishment for states that hold their nominating contests earlier than Feb. 5. Iowa, which held caucuses on Thursday, will not be penalized because, technically, the caucuses are not binding on convention delegates. Nevada, which plans to hold its caucuses on Jan. 19, will not be penalized for the same reason.
Besides the 12 delegates chosen at Saturday's county conventions, two delegates to be chosen at a statewide convention in May will also be sent to the national convention in Minneapolis.
Wyoming's Democratic primary will be held on March 9.
(© 2008 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
