GOP’s Snyder rallies voters for Romney
Posted: November 1, 2012
The Winchester Star
WINCHESTER — It’s crunch time, and the campaigns — and campaign buses — have gone into hyperdrive five days before the presidential election.
One of Republican nominee Mitt Romney’s three campaign buses crisscrossing Virginia rolled into Winchester Wednesday carrying Pete Snyder, chairman of the GOP’s Virginia Victory effort and a paid contributor to Fox News.
Snyder rallied 21 people gathered outside the Winchester Victory Office at 101 Millwood Ave., championing himself as an entrepreneur and warning about the negative economic impact if President Barack Obama and Democratic U.S. Senate candidate from Virginia Tim Kaine win their respective races.
“We need [GOP Senate candidate] George Allen to get our fiscal house in order and to get our country going down the right path,” said Snyder, who founded the Arlington-based social media firm New Media Strategies in 1999.
Allen previously served in the Senate from 2001 to 2007, and Kaine has criticized his fiscal record during that time — when the national debt increased by $3.202 trillion.
An average of the last five polls of likely Virginia voters shows Kaine with a 1 percentage point lead, according to Real Clear Politics, an online aggregator of political news and polls.
Snyder also touted Romney’s Oct. 3 debate performance in Denver, when by most accounts the former Massachusetts governor outperformed Obama.
“And it’s been a sea change in momentum ever since that first debate,” Snyder said.
While the race has tightened since then, according to most polls Romney has so far been unable to overcome Obama’s lead in some key battleground states — especially Ohio — which has 18 electoral votes.
As the Tuesday election approaches, the race to the magic number of 270 electoral votes boils down to eight states where Romney and Obama are actively campaigning: Ohio, Florida, Virginia, New Hampshire, Iowa, Nevada, Colorado and Wisconsin.
According to recent poll averages from Real Clear Politics, Obama holds small leads in all but three of the battleground states — with Romney ahead by half a percentage point in Virginia and holding a small edge in Florida with Colorado tied.
Virginia remains a crucial piece of the puzzle, especially for Romney. Without the state’s 13 electoral votes, Romney’s path to 270 becomes exceedingly difficult. For example, without Virginia or Ohio, he would have to win every other battleground state to take the presidency — assuming all the other states go according to the polls.
“It’s really all in our hands — what we do here in Winchester and in Virginia,” Snyder said.
A victory in the commonwealth isn’t as necessary for an Obama path to victory. For example, he could lose Florida, Virginia, New Hampshire, Colorado and Iowa and return to the White House as long as he holds onto Ohio, Wisconsin and Nevada — three states where he has been leading in the polls.
Snyder said the time has come to pull out all the stops.
“I would systematically harangue every single person in your orbit,” he advised at Wednesday’s gathering.
— Contact Conor Gallagher at cgallagher@winchesterstar.com