The Romney campaign began chasing absentee voters in early December, long before the Iowa caucuses, using phone banks and direct mail. In addition, the former Massachusetts governor has conducted four tele-town hall meetings - big conference calls - with voters contacted from the state’s list of absentee ballot requesters, according to Ryan Williams, a Romney campaign spokesman.
For most of that period, Romney was the front-runner and apparent winner of Iowa and New Hampshire, and the campaign is confident it banked a significant lead in early votes. However, a “recanvassing’’ of the vote in Iowa six days ago narrowly tipped that state to Rick Santorum by 34 votes, and Gingrich shot past Romney in Florida polling conducted after South Carolina shook up the race.
In addition to absentee ballots, the Sunshine State has early voting, which is well underway ahead of next week’s balloting. Five of the state’s 67 counties, including Hillsborough (Tampa), started voting early last week, and the remaining 62 started on Saturday, as South Carolinians were going to the polls. So a significant chunk of votes has been cast since Gingrich’s candidacy gained altitude.
Absentee and early voting have been very brisk, on a pace ahead of the presidential primary four years ago. As of Monday evening, about 301,000 voters had cast ballots - 212,000 absentees and 89,000 early voters - said Chris Cate, spokesman for the Florida secretary of state’s office. That’s 52,000 more than had been submitted as of a day earlier.
In the 2008 presidential primaries, nearly a third of Florida voters cast ballots absentee or at early voting locations, according to data provided by Cate.
That year, about 1.95 million, or 51 percent of registered Republicans, cast ballots in the presidential primary in which Romney finished second to eventual nominee John McCain. This year there are 4.06 million registered Republicans in the state.
