September 21, 2012 04:54 PM UTC

Mitt Romney (Finally) Rallies In Denver Sunday and Monday

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• by: Colorado Pols

It’s actually Jefferson County again, note to out-of-state reporters.

FOX 31’s Eli Stokols, tickets for Sunday’s rally available here:

In Colorado, prominent conservatives far enough removed from the campaign to speak freely and honestly asked the same question about Romney: where has he been?

“President Obama has been here so much he’s probably paying property taxes at this point,” Independence Institute President Jon Caldara told me on Tuesday. “I can’t even remember the last time Mitt Romney’s been here.”

…Since Romney’s last campaign stop here, Obama has spent parts of five days in Colorado holding seven events: rallies in Denver and Grand Junction on Aug. 8; rallies in Pueblo and Colorado Springs on Aug. 9; a rally in Fort Collins on Aug. 28, the first night of the Republican National Convention; a rally in Boulder on Sept. 2 on the eve of the Democratic National Convention; and a post-convention rally in Golden last Thursday, Sept. 13.

The GOP ticket’s only presence during that time was an Aug. 14 rally featuring vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan at Lakewood High School.

To be fair, Stokols should update that list to include Paul Ryan’s rally in Colorado Springs early this month. But the point about the campaign’s lack of face time in Colorado is valid.

Politico’s Charles Mahtesian:

There’s been grumbling about the relatively little attention he’s devoted to the populous, competitive Denver suburbs as compared to the Western Slope and Colorado Springs, where he’s made several visits to energize the GOP base.

“I think Mitt Romney needs to be here, and he needs to be in the Jefferson County and Arapahoe County suburbs, not in Pueblo,” former state GOP chair Dick Wadhams tells Stokols.

As we observed yesterday, the presidential race in Colorado has remained stubbornly close between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, even as Obama shows signs of beginning to pull away in other closely-watched swing states. Factor in the (we’re being as nice as we can be about this) inadequacy of local surrogates like ex-gubernatorial candidate Bob Beauprez, and there’s a clear and pressing need for Romney to spend time here. And that makes Romney’s seven-week absence, and Romney’s previous visits to remote places like Craig and Ft. Lupton, seem even more like a major strategic error on the part of his campaign.

Here’s a theory we will go ahead postulate, though: what if Romney’s so-far ability to keep Colorado in contention is the result of him staying away from the state? Before you dismiss us out of hand, consider that this state’s well-developed liberal infrastructure has bedeviled both Romney and running mate Paul Ryan pretty much every time they’ve appeared here. Combine that with Romney’s propensity for saying precisely the wrong thing at the wrong time, and it’s honestly possible you have a candidate who does better staying off the stump.

One thing’s for sure, they’re going to poll the hell out of Colorado on Tuesday.