Sponsors of the Missouri bill to move the presidential primary from February 7 to early March have given up. The bill is considered dead. Therefore, the 2012 primary will be on February 7. However, the state Republican Party has decided that the primary will be a “beauty contest” only, and that the state party will use March caucuses to choose the delegates to the national convention.

Missouri will also be holding presidential primaries for the Democratic, Constitution, and Libertarian Parties. These are also “beauty contest” presidential primaries, which don’t actually chose delegates for those parties either.

The bill to move the date of the presidential primaries also would have raised the filing fee to run in a presidential primary from $1,000 to $5,000 in 2012, and $10,000 thereafter. The failure of this bill to pass increases the odds that candidates who are seeking the Constitution Party nomination, or the Libertarian Party nomination, will now file. Missouri Libertarians have used their presidential primary in the past, just to test the voter appeal of the various candidates. Missouri does not have registration by party, and any voter is free to choose any party’s presidential primary ballot. Thanks to Frontloading HQ for this news.