Politics & Government

Mitt Romney Wins Big in Northville

Despite Romney's small margin win in the State of Michigan, he saw a large victory over Rick Santorum in Northville's precincts.

Mitt Romney is the winner of the Michigan Presidential Primary with Rick Santorum trailing close behind.

Romney earned 41 percent of the vote in the Mitten State while Santorum captured 38 percent of the Republican vote.

In Northville, Romney saw a bigger victory than he saw statewide.

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In the city's two precincts, 25.3 percent of the 4,970 people registered to vote cast a ballot. And 50.8 percent, or 639, of those voters backed Mitt Romney at the polls. Exactly 299 votes were cast in the city for Rick Santorum. That accounts for 23.76 percent of the city's vote. Ron Paul came in a distant third with 8.26 percent of the vote, or 104 votes.

Northville Township's 15 precincts and absentee ballot voters also favored Romney. About 27 percent of the township's registered voters, or 5,173, cast a ballot in the election.

Find out what's happening in Northvillewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Romney drew 3,020 of those votes, or 58.38 percent. Santorum garnered the support of 1,225 township voters, which made up 23.68 percent of the vote. Ron Paul followed in the polls with 398 votes, or 7.69 percent.

Political leaders react

It's not surprising that Romney won big in the area, said Oakland County Commissioner Kathy Crawford, who represents a portion of the city of Northville.

"He has conservative views," she said. "Maybe he is not as appealing to a tea party person but he has the basic values I identify with … family and religion and things I can relate to."

She added, "He’s like a lot of other people in our community."

Tom Stroup, Northville resident and chair of the 11th Congressional District Republican Committee said he too was pleased with the results.

"It was a hard fought victory. When you are ahead and you fall behind," he said alluding to Romney's lag in recent polls, "It’s very satisfying to be here."

Stroup was in attendance at Romney's celebration in Novi Tuesday night.

He added that Romney's business savvy will be a huge asset for the country, if Romney is elected.

"I think what it boiled down to is the economy," Stroup said. "(Voters) looked to Mitt Romney and they looked at his track record as a leader."

The close results between Romney and Santorum mean that the party has two strong candidates, Stroup said. Romney is the stronger contender to beat Obama, he said, but Santorum is also a good candidate.

Scott Craig, president of the , interprets the small margin differently.

"I thought Romney would have a more clear victory. I thought Romney would eek it out by another 5 percent, he said. "Romney is really struggling to capture the support of Republican Party."

"I think really that in the last couple of elections, the Republicans have moved pretty far to the right," Craig said. And that has led to the lack of a strong candidate, he added. "The one thing that's playing against him is the article he wrote about letting Detroit go bankrupt. That is not resonating well with voters in Michigan."

Still, he admits that Romney is the bigger threat to Obama's re-election.

"He's trying to pretend he's ultra conservative," Craig said. "Once he has the nomination locked in, he'll move back to the center."

If someone other than Ron Paul gains the Republican nomination, Paul Sherbeck of Northville said he will not be voting Republican.

On Tuesday, Sherbeck was outside of campaigning for Paul right up until the polls closed. He has also gone door-to-door to advocate for his candidate.

"Ron Paul's message of economic and personal liberty is beginning to resonate with people," he said.

Sherbeck usually votes libertarian but voted Republican in this election to support Paul.

By the numbers

The results from the City of Northville for the primary election on Feb. 28, 2012:

Precinct Gingrich Paul Romney Santorum 1 25
49
279
128
2 39
55
360
171

In the city 113 Democratic Patry ballots were issued. Nearly all of those, 89.38 percent, were for Barack Obama.

Many of the ballots cast in Northville Township were absentee. Exactly 2,151 voters opted for absentee ballot.  In total, 604 votes were cast for a Democratic candidate. And 89.7 percent of those votes were for Barack Obama. Nearly 10 percent of Democratic ballot voters said they were "uncommitted."

Here are the precinct-by-precinct results from Northville Township for the primary election.

Precinct Gingrich Paul Santorum Romney 1 11
22
56
133
2 3
18
33
52
3 12
26
79
220
4 16
30
87
267
5 2
7
35
50
6 7
21
68
131
7 9
42
58
100
8 6
13
56
69
9 5
17
36
49
10 3
3
23
46
11 7
13
50
99
12 15
40
99
209
13 9
18
60
58
14 10
17
65
148
15 3
11
42
101

Editor's note: There was a typo in the Precinct 15 total for Rick Santorum in a previous version of this story. He earned 42 votes in Precinct 15. Also, Tom Stroup's title was incorrect in a previous version of this story. He is chair of the 11th Congressional District Republican Committee.


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