Monday, October 18, 2010

Founder: 'Draft Christie' Website Off To 'Good Start'

A website (www.draftchristie2012.com) launched on October 14th to enlist the support of Americans in an effort to draft New Jersey Governor Chris Christie to run for President in 2012 signed up 838 supporters in its first 72 hours. New Facebook and Twitter features are also showing significant support.
“It is a start and I think it is a good one,” said Donald Sico, Executive Director of www.draftchristie2012.com. “But we have a long way to go if we are to convince this reluctant warrior.”
The website was launched at 6 a.m. on Thursday October 14th to coincide with the 365th anniversary of the birth of William Penn, the founder of Philadelphia. The first list of supporters was compiled at 6 a.m. Sunday morning, October 17. Updates will be provided publicly on a weekly basis. The complete list will be given to Governor Christie at the completion of the effort.
The 838 supporters who filled out a form at the website represent 45 of the 50 states (Alaska, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota and Wyoming had no supporters thus far.) as well as overseas military personnel and one former New Jerseyan now living in Montreal, Canada. Governor Christie’s home state of New Jersey led the list with 133 supporters followed by California (70), Texas (55), Pennsylvania (40), Florida (37), Illinois (36), New York (35), Virginia (32) and North Carolina (28). Supporters included military officers, county committee members (and one county chair from South Dakota), elected officials, delegates and Tea Party members. Numerous independents and several Democrats also supported the effort.
The Facebook page, which was launched on Saturday evening, had more than 100 followers by Monday morning and the Twitter site had 32. Both the Facebook and Twitter sites can be linked to from the www.draftchristie2012 site. As of Monday morning, the webpage had nearly 5,000 (4,926) “unique visitors” and more than 34,000 (34,226) “hits.” The top five referrers to the webpage were: www.observer.com, www.politicsdaily.com, www.facebook.com, www.philadelphia.cbslocal.com, www.politickernj.com, www.blogs.app.com, www.iowaindependent.com, www.dailyrecord.com, www.philly.com and www.salon.com.
Those who filled out the form were given the opportunity to “comment.” A compilation of many of the comments is included as an addendum to this release. Reporters who would like to be put in touch with commenters from their states can make that request by contacting  Sico by email at dsiconj@gmail.com.

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