Waukee Caucuses Get Under Way

Things were rather quiet in the smallest of the four Waukee caucus precincts Tuesday night. By 6:30 p.m., only a couple of dozen people had filed into the commons at Waukee South Middle School waiting to cast their votes for their favorite Republican candidate.

Precinct captain Nick Gruber said they were expecting between 150 and 200 voters tonight.

“We’re hoping for that anyway,” he said.

Andrea Kappelman of Waukee was still undecided as she sat at a round cafeteria table scanning political handouts she had picked up.

“I’ve been pretty wishy-washy,” she said. “I’ve pretty much floated back and forth between Bachmann and Santorum, but I’m leaning toward Santorum.”

Kappelman’s stepdaughter, Molly, 17, registered upon entering the precinct. She didn’t know much about the candidates yet, but she knew exactly who she didn’t want.

“I don’t want the guy who said, ‘Iowa picks corn, New Hampshire picks presidents,’” she said. “I’ve never really paid much attention other than that.”

“I need to start so I know who I need to vote for,” she said.

In all, Dallas County will host 27 different caucus sites tonight. Polk County will host almost seven times that number with 183.

The caucuses began at 7 p.m. For some areas, results will be known in a matter of 30 minutes or so. Larger caucuses could take a couple of hours. That depends on how many candidate representatives speak, how long they drag on and how many votes need to be counted.

The results from Precinct 2 at Waukee South Middle School: Santorum 25, Romney 21, Paul 15, Gingrich 10, Perry 9, and Bachmann 3.

Those results were as of 8 p.m.

The GOP record for caucus-goers is 118,411, set in 2008, when Mike Huckabee won, followed by Mitt Romney, Fred D. Thompson, John McCain, Ron Paul and Rudy Giuliani.

Patch will provide live coverage of the results as they come in.