Storm scrambles GOP convention

Late Saturday night, the RNC was planning to issue a release announcing the formation of a "working group of representatives from each of the states in Hurricane Gustav's path. The group will ensure that all affected delegates have information and assistance in real time.


President Bush is unlikely to make it to the Republican National Convention, and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) may deliver his acceptance speech via satellite because of the historically huge hurricane threatening New Orleans, top officials said.

Republican National Convention 2008

"The Affected States Working Group is led by all five state party chairs from the affected area, along with other delegation officials. The purpose of the group will be to regularly brief their delegates and convention planners, provide access to timely information and assistance, and give input on appropriate steps that can be taken from Minnesota."

Officials insisted that the convention, scheduled to open here on Monday, will go on — albeit in a more limited and sedate form — even if Hurricane Gustav stays on its projected path. New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin ordered a mandatory evacuation beginning at 8 a.m. Sunday after federal officials said Gustav could grow to a catastrophic Category 5 and hit Monday afternoon somewhere between eastern Texas and western Mississippi.

McCain made plans to travel to a threatened area of the Gulf Coast on Sunday, accompanied by his wife, Cindy, and running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. They planned to meet Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour (R) in Jackson, Miss., aides said.

McCain was scheduled to deliver his acceptance speech Thursday but now may do so from the devastation zone if the storm hits the U.S. coast with the ferocity feared by forecasters.

At the start of his remarks at a rally in Washington, Pa., on Saturday night, McCain said: "I would like all of us, obviously, to keep in our thoughts and our prayers the people of the Gulf Coast, especially New Orleans, that are threatened by this terrible natural disaster, the hurricane. They need to know — and I know that they know — that they are in our hearts and prayers as this impending hurricane approaches.

“The great God, that he could spare — at a minimum — the loss that might result from this natural disaster. So my friends, as we enjoy this great rally, we will keep them in our thoughts and our hearts and our prayers.”

Officials of the convention, the Republican Party, the White House and the McCain campaign were all scrambling this weekend to rewrite more than a year of planning for what they had hoped would be a joyful four days starting Monday.

McCain told Chris Wallace of “Fox News Sunday” in an interview taped for broadcast Sunday that the convention could be rescheduled. “It just wouldn't be appropriate to have a festive occasion while a near-tragedy or a terrible challenge is presented in the form of a natural disaster,” McCain said. “So we're monitoring it from day to day, and I'm saying a few prayers, too.”