Florida primary looms as pivotal for Republicans

Florida’s primaries exclude independents, which could be bad news for John McCain.

MCCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Florida’s winner-take-all Republican primary on Tuesday has turned into a pivotal four-man race that could determine a front-runner for the presidential nomination and discard at least one of the leading candidates before Super Tuesday next week.

The Republicans are racing across Florida today to court party members and build momentum before the next round of 22 contests. The winner gets all of the state’s 57 delegates to the party’s nominating convention and, more important, a burst of momentum.

The leading Democrats are avoiding Florida because of an internal party scrap over the primary schedule. Despite the absence of candidates, Democrats turned out in droves in early voting, a sign they are highly motivated to win the fall election.

Victory for them comes with no delegates but bragging rights in the largest state that could go either way in the general election.

Independent voters, who may tip the results in November, will be sitting on the sidelines for the presidential primaries Tuesday, an exclusion that could shape the results.

Florida, the largest and most diverse state to host a primary so far, is also the first to hold a “closed primary,” meaning only registered Democrats and Republicans will be allowed to vote. State party leaders prefer it that way, partly to prevent members of the opposing party from crossing lines to skew the results.

“The exciting thing is that this will be the first time the winner will truly be elected by people who have an R or a D by their name every day and not just when convenient,” said Sharon Day, a Republican national committeewoman from Fort Lauderdale.

Republican leaders and political analysts say the exclusion of independents will help Mike Huckabee, whose support largely comes from conservative Christian Republicans. It may also help Mitt Romney, a widely regarded Republican who has courted conservatives while downplaying his moderate record as former governor of Massachusetts.

“Closed primaries are more helpful to Huckabee. That doesn’t mean he will win. But Huckabee would attract the smallest number of independent voters,” said Ron Rapoport, an expert on independent voters at the College of William and Mary in Virginia. “McCain has always had strong appeal to independents, who like his reformist agenda. But it has created difficulties for him within the Republican Party.”

McCain shrugs off the absence of independents in Tuesday’s primary, noting that he received more Republican votes than any other candidate in New Hampshire and South Carolina, while getting a lot of help from independents.

In New Hampshire, known for its large portion of independent-minded voters, McCain won 38 percent of independents and 37 percent of Republicans, according to exit polls commissioned by NBC News.

“I hope that’s an indication that I can appeal to a broad base of supporters in the general election,” McCain said last week. While in Miami, Romney promoted himself as a Washington outsider, the candidate of change. He derided McCain as a has-been, saying, “He can talk about the past better than anyone I know.”

Rudy Giuliani, relatively moderate on issues such as abortion rights and immigration, has poured much of his campaign resources into winning Florida. Some independents and Democrats admire the former New York mayor because of his leadership after the 2001 terrorist attacks, but these voters cannot take part in the closed Republican primary.

On the Democratic side, the closed primary may help Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is backed by much of the party establishment. Barack Obama, who has drawn young voters and political neophytes, will be deprived in Florida of votes cast by independents.