Another deadline, another day of waiting.
State Sen. Kirk Dillard, locked in a tight race with state Sen. Bill Brady for the Republican gubernatorial nomination, has been in a holding pattern since the Feb. 2 primary election, when results were too close to call the winner.
Even today, the deadline for all county clerks to send their results to state officials, no concession is in clear sight.
"I certainly don't think that it would be before the end of this week," Wes Bleed, Dillard's campaign spokesman, told me a few minutes ago. "We're not anywhere close to saying, 'OK, we're ready to hold a press conference.'"
According to Brady's campaign, the candidates stand 247 votes apart, with Brady leading — and Dillard's camp doesn't quibble with that figure.
"We're not in dispute with the Brady campaign," Bleed said. "We don't think there's anything sizeable beyond that."
Yet Bleed emphasized that the state has not released an official figure, and that today is merely the deadline for counties to mail their results, not for the State Board of Elections to receive them.
"Those numbers may not end up at the state board for several days, just because of the mail," Bleed said.
Further, state officials still need to go through the results and certify them. That process is important for ensuring that the numbers add up, Bleed said.
"With this small a number of votes, you've got the possibility that something else could turn up. There could be something else that could show up to be a mathematical error or something," Bleed said. "The senator just wants to make sure that all of these counties are adding and readding and checking and rechecking."
Yet Bleed acknowledged the Dillard campaign's desire to move beyond the primary race and allow Brady to move forward with a general-election campaign if he is indeed the nominee.
He said Dillard's campaign may not wait until March 5, the certification deadline, to make an announcement.
"I would sure hate to let something like that drag on after the 5th," Bleed said. "I would hope that we would do something before the 5th and say yea or nay."
Although, if the margin narrows even further, this waiting could go on much longer. Brady's lead after the primary was more than 400 votes, a margin sliced down by late-arriving absentee and provisional ballots.
Dillard has said that if the final results show he is within 100 votes of Brady's lead, he would consider a recount — but Bleed left room to budge even in that case.
"If it's within 100 votes, he would have to look at that pretty seriously," Bleed said. "Is that a magical number? I don't think so."
Windy Citizen 