Utah GOP chair warns outside groups

[ccharles000]

With Utah's Republican caucuses less than two weeks away, state party Chairman Dave Hansen is warning out-of-state groups that they could risk political backlash by intervening too aggressively in his state's GOP nominating contests.

Incumbent Sen. Robert Bennett has been under attack from a group of primary challengers for what they deem an insufficiently conservative profile. The anti-tax Club for Growth has deployed television ads and robocalls attacking Bennett's Senate record, including his 2008 vote in favor of the bank bailouts.

But Hansen told POLITICO the March 23 caucuses are the "ultimate retail political show," and that broad-based messaging can matter less to a campaign than its ability to court delegates at the convention.

"These delegates like to make their own decision and they want to make it based primarily on what they personally learn about the candidates and what they learn from the candidates themselves," he said. "Utahans are not crazy about real negative campaigns. If it gets personal and negative, that tends to have a negative reaction."

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/34275.html

[TommyO]

1. Yet so many Utahns intervened in the fight against marriage equality.

Screw 'em (with apologies to the many Democratic Utahns here).