Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., is the heavy favorite going into the 22 Republican primaries today, but a last-ditch effort by conservatives to drum up support for Mitt Romney is paying off, some polls show.
The move to help Romney underscores the deep-rooted dislike of McCain among conservatives that could hurt the Republican ticket if he wins the nomination, many political analysts believe.
“We’re seeing a huge movement in the past few weeks toward Romney,” said Erick Erickson, editor of the conservative blog Redstate.org. “McCain has failed to play nice with conservatives in this election, and Romney has. McCain scares a lot of people.”
Perhaps McCain’s biggest enemies are popular conservative talk show hosts who have rallied behind Romney as the true conservative alternative to McCain. They say McCain has turned his back on the GOP too many times to warrant their support. Some of the positions McCain has taken that have angered the Republican base include opposing some Republican tax cuts, supporting legislation that would provide illegal immigrants with a path to citizenship and calling for the military to close the Guantanamo Bay detention camp.
McCain has promoted himself as a bona fide conservative but has not convinced the far right.
Ann Coulter, a well-known conservative commentator, said last week that if McCain wins the GOP nomination, “then Hillary [Clinton]’s going to be our girl because she’s more conservative than he is. I think she would be stronger on the war on terrorism. I absolutely believe that.”
Former McCain campaign adviser Dan Schnur said McCain was in a historically unusual position but could still prevail.
“If he becomes the nominee, it will be the first time in 30 years the Republican general election candidate didn’t come out of the conservative movement,” Schnur said. “And that adds additional challenges for him.”
Republican political analysts agree that if McCain wins the nomination, he could bolster his conservative credentials and unify the party quickly by selecting a conservative running mate.
