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Local GOP to endorse candidate in March
The local Republican Party will endorse a presidential candidate next month.
Meanwhile, Guam’s Republican Party officially endorsed U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz on Friday ahead of the Iowa causes this week. Cruz right now trails GOP frontrunner Donald Trump, according to stateside polls.
“We will endorse the nominee via votes of the locally elected delegates” in March, local GOP spokesperson Ivan Blanco told Saipan Tribune in an email.
Typically, the three Pacific territories—Guam, American Samoa and the Northern Mariana Islands—and Hawaii back the same candidate for the GOP nomination, according to Cruz strategic consultant Dennis Lennox in an email.
Hawaii, with 19 delegates, has its caucus on March 8; American Samoa, with nine delegates, has its caucus on March 22; and the Northern Mariana Islands, also with nine delegates, holds its convention on March 15.
The Iowa caucus is slated for Monday (mainland time) and the Guam caucus on March 12.
In his endorsement letter, Gov. Eddie Calvo—Guam chairman of “Cruz for President”—said Cruz and he share many views on fiscal and foreign policy.
On immigration, Calvo said the federal government has “imposed the most liberal immigration policy in U.S. history upon our island with contrition, recompense, or even acknowledgement.” “Your concern over and solutions to the mismanagement and irresponsibility of the federal government in reckless immigration policy will serve our island well,” Calvo said.
On the protection of the rights of citizens to speak and protest, to worship, and to protect themselves and bear arms, Calvo said he wishes the federal government would understand how meaningful it is for someone in Washington to recognize that these rights are even more important to a territory “often burdened by the federal behemoth.”
“Your crusade against the consolidation of federal power means something real and vital to the future of Guam and the protection of our culture, language, and the political and economy we need to thrive,” Calvo said. “It has been a crushing and ever-increasing burden for years.”
