Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam delivers his State of the State address to a joint session of the General Assembly on Monday, Jan. 30, 2012, in Nashville, Tenn.Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney named Gov. Bill Haslam his statewide campaign chairman Tuesday just as a new poll showed the former Massachusetts governor trailing Rick Santorum in Tennessee.
“I’m pleased to have so much support in Tennessee,” Romney said in a news release. “Voters in the Volunteer State have been hit hard by the Obama economy.”
In the same news release, the Romney campaign said it has rounded up “a full slate” of 48 delegate candidates on the Tennessee ballot, including Wayne Cropp, of Hixson, and Oscar Brock, of Lookout Mountain.
Haslam said the number of delegates “represents the strong support Mitt has from Memphis to Mountain City.” But with early voting set to begin today, a new poll puts Romney 7 percentage points behind Santorum, a former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania with no organization in Tennessee.
The American Research Group Inc. poll telephoned 600 likely GOP voters Feb. 8-9 and found Santorum winning with 34 percent, followed by Romney at 27 percent, Newt Gingrich at 16 percent and Ron Paul at 13 percent, the Knoxville News Sentinel reported.