U.S. Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, has done the delegate math and believes it
adds up to a Republican presidential nomination for Mitt Romney.
Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, won with an unofficial nearly 50
percent of the vote in Illinois' primary Tuesday, followed by contender Rick
Santorum with 35 percent.
The New York Times and Wall Street Journal put Romney's delegate total at
563, which is just shy of the halfway mark to the 1,144 needed for the
nomination. Santorum, a former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania, trails him by
300 delegates, according to those sources, and other contenders Newt Gingrich
and Ron Paul trail him by a wide margin.
"Now it looks like with 550 some (delegates) ... that it's even more
impossible for them to stop him," Grassley said during a conference call with
reporters Wednesday.
Though Grassley has said he is not endorsing any candidate, he has said
recently and reiterated in Wednesday's call that Romney looked to be on the
road to victory and he would support him if he becomes the nominee.
Grassley added he believes Romney is electable, and he cited the ongoing
high unemployment and even more so the increasingly high gas prices as reasons
why President Obama can be beat in the Nov. 6 general election.
The unemployment rate is about 8.3 percent, according to the Bureau of
Labor Statistics. And in southeast Iowa, gas prices are between about $3.60
and $3.80, and expected to rise throughout the summer.
Grassley said given those circumstances, he believes that Romney could
also win Iowa, which went for Obama in 2008 and for President George W. Bush
in 2004.
He said, however, that Iowa, Florida, Ohio and Virginia are going to be
the toughest among a dozen battleground states.
"I don't think you're going to find the Iowa electorate a whole lot
different than the national electorate except for two states, New York and
California," Grassley said, and then added a couple other northwest states.
Grassley said Romney's running mate would probably be selected from among
the politicians in those battleground states. But he ruled out Gov. Terry
Branstad as a potential running mate, saying Iowa doesn't have enough
electoral votes to put him among the contenders.
