Presidential candidates already making pushes in SEC primary states

Texas 155

Georgia 76

Tennessee 58

Alabama 50

Virginia 49

Oklahoma 43

Massachusetts 42

Arkansas 40

Minnesota 38

Colorado 37

Alaska 28

Vermont 16

Source: Republican National Committee

With three months to go until the SEC primary, a handful of presidential campaigns are already making inroads in Georgia and other states voting in the March 1 delegate bonanza, bringing the unsettled race more sharply into focus.

Republican front-runner Donald Trump — who holds a rally in Macon on Monday night — and Ben Carson have been doing what few expected when the two outsiders burst on the scene this summer: organizing real campaigns in the SEC states.

They are not the only ones. U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, dominates the scene in his home state, which has the largest trove of delegates on March 1, while building a formidable list of grass-roots backers elsewhere in the region.

U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., has seen his support grow in recent weeks. And former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, whose campaign has struggled for traction, still has regional ties and the money to hang in through March 1.

On the Democratic side, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has the political establishment locked down throughout the South. But Vermont U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, who held a rally in Atlanta last week, is not ceding the territory as he corrals energy from the activist left and aims to crack Clinton's strong African-American support.

All the activity comes with an important caveat: The early states still matter most.

Whoever looks strong in Iowa on Feb. 1, followed by New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada, will drive media coverage and fundraising heading into SEC primary.

“Momentum is going to matter a tremendous amount,” said Matt Mackowiak, an Austin, Texas-based Republican political strategist who is unaligned in the presidential race. “Not everyone who’s viable now is viable then. The field will change.”

Case in point: Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker built an operation in Georgia in the early weeks of his campaign, but he dropped out in September. Cruz picked up most of Walker's leadership team.

“Cruz has kind of been the little engine that could in many respects,” said Chip Lake, an unaligned Georgia Republican political consultant. “He has had a very consistent organization with some top-notch leaders.”

A Southern stand

No candidate's strategy hinges more on the South than that of Cruz, who plans to make his stand in the region. He's embarked on bus tours through Georgia, Alabama, Arkansas and Tennessee to build the infrastructure for his campaign.

But he can’t accuse the poll-leading outsiders of ignoring the South.

Trump has hired state directors throughout the region. Carson and Trump both filled out full delegate slates in Alabama, while Bush did not. Bush still will be able to compete for all 50 of Alabama's convention delegates, but it was a show of strength that Carson and Trump could find supporters from all corners of the state to present themselves as delegates.

Carson and Trump also both secured enough petitions to get on the ballot in Virginia, which has the toughest requirements in the country: Campaigns must submit 5,000 verified petition signatures, including 200 from each of the state's 11 congressional districts. In late 2011, Newt Gingrich failed to meet even tougher requirements to get on the Virginia ballot — despite leading in the national polls at the time — an early sign that his campaign wasn't built for the long haul.

Carson and Trump are "doing things that you expect a regular, old presidential campaign to do, not just some outsider candidate who's not serious," said Josh Putnam, a University of Georgia political science lecturer and author of the blog Frontloading HQ, which covers the intricacies of the primary process.

Bush has been hitting SEC football tailgates from Athens to Starkville, Miss. His allied super PAC, Right to Rise, has booked $12 million in television ad time across Georgia, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia, with an additional $2 million planned, a spokesman said.

While 565 delegates will be up for grabs on March 1, mostly in the South, it is impossible for one Republican to win them all. States voting from March 1 through March 15 under Republican National Committee rules must award their delegates proportionally and not winner-take-all. There are 2,470 total convention delegates.

Proportional states award delegates based on who performs best statewide and in individual congressional districts. Certain candidates who don’t have a prayer statewide could start picking off districts — consider the differences between GOP voters in Atlanta’s 5th District and the North Georgia mountains of the 9th — and dangle that support at the Republican convention.

“If you think you can get 5 or 6 or 7 percent of the delegates, you can come to the convention with some muscle,” Gingrich said. “(Ohio Gov. John) Kasich will probably carry Ohio. (New Jersey Gov. Chris) Christie will probably carry New Jersey. They’re asking themselves, ‘Why would I drop out?’ ”

Georgia’s boon

The unsettled field and the regional vote have also fundamentally reshaped the art of campaigning in Georgia.

“Atlanta is not simply a money stop anymore. We’re now seeing organizational efforts in Georgia and the Southeast like you didn’t see in earlier cycles,” said John Watson, a political consultant in Atlanta. “Candidates are actually spending time and resources to organize in places like Georgia.”

Ask state Rep. Terry Rogers, R-Clarkesville, whether he’s noticed a difference this cycle, and he will quickly rattle off the names of 10 GOP presidential candidates.

“Those are the candidates I’ve personally met this year. And I didn’t meet them just because I was a legislator — I met most outside the Capitol,” he said. “I never would have had that chance before. The only candidate I saw last time? Newt Gingrich.”

Democrats, too, are spending time in Georgia.

Clinton, the party's front-runner, is relying on her popularity with black voters across the South as a firewall in case her top rival, Sanders, wins Iowa or New Hampshire.

And Sanders hopes to narrow the sizable gap between him and Clinton by winning over black voters, who form the bulk of the Democratic electorate in Georgia and most other Southern states. That's why he made sure to visit the Martin Luther King Jr. Center and meet with the daughter of the slain civil rights leader last week when he visited Atlanta.

Nick Selby, one of the more than 5,000 people who piled inside the Fox Theatre to hear Sanders speak, said he was just happy to hear from a contender. He's in Georgia by way of Arizona, also an oft-forgotten state on the presidential trail.

“When your state gets ignored, it feels like your vote gets ignored,” said Selby, a Georgia Tech student. “This finally gives me the feeling I can actually be involved in the process.”