Arkansas' 2nd largest city won't send delegates, alternates to conventions

By The Associated Press

FORT SMITH — For the first time that any one can remember, no one from Arkansas' second-largest city will be a delegate or alternate to either the Republican or Democratic national convention. Political leaders say the economy is mostly to blame.

"It's a tough economic time and not anything that somebody can pick up and travel and spend a week off work for," Jake Files, chairman of the Sebastian County Republican Party, says. "We're committed. I think it's just a function of timing and other activities."

Files' Democratic counterpart, Lee Webb, agrees.

"It was probably more of a financial consideration for most," Webb says. "My business doesn't allow me to get off for that many days."

Also, he says, the convention schedules conflict with the start of school, making it hard for many people to get away.

The Democratic convention is next week in Denver; the GOP convention starts Sept. 1 in St. Paul, Minn. The number of Arkansas delegates at each convention will be about 50.

To be a delegate to a convention, a party loyalist must be elected at the state level. Both Files and Webb say Sebastian County residents didn't have an interest in pursuing a spot.

Arkansas Republican Party Chairman Dennis Milligan regrets the circumstances.

"It's unfortunate because we would like to obviously have equal representation all the way around, but that's the way it kind of shook out," he says.

Sebastian County, which includes Fort Smith, is the state's fourth-largest and will have no delegates or alternates. The state's most populous county, Pulaski, will send 23 delegates and alternates to the conventions. Washington County will send 19; Benton County will have nine.

Peggy Jeffries of Fort Smith, a former Republican National Committee member, says county Republicans have become disenchanted with their cohorts in other parts of the state and nation.

"We just have become too independent for them up here and we're not involved," she says. "Everybody has just kind of had so many discouragements they don't have time to worry with it right now."

Jeffries says county Republicans disagree with the state party on immigration, for example, and want tougher border patrol.

Former state GOP chairman, Gunner DeLay, says Jeffries may be right in that some western Arkansas Republicans differ with state leaders. But DeLay, now the county prosecutor, says policy clashes haven't made county Republicans less active.

DeLay says some party loyalists are in bad health or have business concerns that will keep them away from the convention. For others, travel expenses may be too high.

For more information see Monday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.