MEDIA ROOTS – When visiting the Republican National Committee’s home page, one will find it stated that the RNC is “not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee.” However, on the party’s Facebook page, a photo of volunteers phone-banking for Mitt Romney was uploaded last week. There is absolutely no reference to the Ron Paul campaign when the party’s national convention is to be held next month in Tampa to determine the party’s official endorsement.
Last Friday, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow discussed the myth that Mitt Romney is already the official nominee for the Republican National Committee. Maddow quoted RNC rule 40(b) which explains that “each candidate for nomination … shall demonstrate the support of a plurality of the delegates from each of five (5) or more states ….” Dr. Paul has already received the overwhelming support from Republican delegates in Iowa, Maine, Minnesota, and Louisiana going into next Saturday’s Nebraska State Convention where 23 at-large delegates will be selected to go to Tampa.
Additionally, according to RNC rule 30, the national committee does not recognize a state’s binding of delegates such as the case in Nevada and Massachusetts. Last February, the Paul campaign was able to secure 22 out of the 28 delegates in Nevada that are currently bound by the state’s committee rules to vote for Mitt Romney. In an unprecedented move in Mitt Romney’s home state of Massachusetts, the RNC state committee stripped seventeen delegates of their credentials because they refused to sign an affidavit promising they would back Mitt Romney at the RNC. The former governor has 38 bound delegates during the first round of voting in Tampa but has zero bound delegates should there be a second round of voting.
Litigation is already under way when a group unaffiliated with the Paul campaign–referred to as Lawyers for Ron Paul–filed suit against the Republican National Committee last month in California’s 9th Circuit Court after reports of electoral fraud and intimidation continue to surface around the country.
Oskar Mosco
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Austin Petersen of Freedom Works and RT’s Abby Martin discuss the intimidation against Ron Paul delegates.
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Lawyers for Ron Paul describe the civil rights lawsuit filed in federal court on behalf of American voters.
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Photo provided by Flickr user DonkeyHotey.
