Romney Takes Washington Ahead of a Big Election Day Mitt Romney won Saturday's nonbinding caucuses in Washington State, handing him a symbolic victory in his quest for the Republican nomination as he heads into the critical Super Tuesday contests just three days away. The vote was a nonbinding straw poll and has no bearing on the selection of the state's 43 delegates. Of those, 40 are up for grabs, but they will not be picked until later. All four candidates remaining in the race - Mr. Romney, Rick Santorum, Representative Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich - actively campaigned in Washington, but none concentrated their efforts there as intensely as Mr. Paul. Mr. Romney and Mr. Santorum, the leading rivals for the nomination, had hoped for some momentum from Washington heading into the big vote next week on Super Tuesday, when 10 states vote. "The voters of Washington have sent a signal that they do not want a Washington insider in the White House," Mr. Romney said in a statement as he campaigned in Ohio. All three of his opponents are tied to the nation's capital, but he has focused his attacks on Mr. Santorum as an insider who does not understand the economy. "They want a conservative businessman who understands the private sector," Mr. Romney said. Before the caucuses, Mr. Romney visited Bellevue, Wash., on Friday, in the western, more moderate part of the state, while Mr. Santorum held events on Thursday in Spokane and Pasco, both more conservative areas. Mr. Paul was the only candidate in the state on Saturday, greeting caucusgoers on Saturday in Puyallup. At some of the sites, his supporters cried foul, saying they had been asked to declare that they were registered Republicans. State officials said that roughly 80,000 people had turned out to vote. This is the first time in recent history that Washington's nominating contest has come before Super Tuesday, and as a result, it was positioned to influence that big day. As the caucuses unfolded on Saturday, Mr. Romney, Mr. Santorum and Mr. Gingrich all campaigned in Ohio, the most coveted of the 10 states voting Tuesday. Georgia, which also votes Tuesday, has more delegates, but Ohio is a major battleground in the fall, while Georgia is all but certain to vote Republican. A victory in Ohio seems almost essential for Mr. Santorum, who has said he can beat President Obama in the fall because he can appeal to blue-collar voters in similar swing states. But his onetime lead in the polls there has dissipated since Mr. Romney won Michigan. A Quinnipiac University poll conducted Wednesday and Thursday showed Mr. Santorum and Mr. Romney in a dead heat. Mr. Santorum also faces delegate issues in Ohio. He failed to file full slates in three of the state's Congressional districts, so he is not eligible to compete for all of the state's 48 bound delegates who are up for grabs. Mike DeWine, Ohio's attorney general and a Santorum backer, said in an interview that if Mr. Santorum won the popular vote in a district in which he had no delegates, he would seek to be awarded its delegates after the fact. "If he carries a Congressional district, it would be totally unfair for voters of that district to have their will overridden," Mr. DeWine said. The Romney campaign said Mr. Santorum's failure to file a full slate in Ohio, and his failure to get on the ballot at all in Virginia, showed that he was ill-equipped to take on Mr. Obama.