The Hill News

Rick Santorum claims that he is closer to Mitt Romney in the delegate count than the official projection and that soon his count and the party's will match up.

It's a move by the former Pennsylvania senator to counter Romney's claim that no other candidate can catch him in the delegate count.

But there is a discrepancy between his campaign's delegate count and the official count given by the Republican National Committee.

The RNC has Romney in the lead with 416 delegates, Santorum second with 170, followed by Newt Gingrich with 133 and Ron Paul with 26.

Santorum claims his tally is higher. His campaign held a conference call with reporters on Tuesday to argue the race for the 1,144 delegates needed to clinch the nomination is closer than it appears.

His campaign estimates Santorum has about 140 more delegates than the official count. They put him at 311, with Romney in the lead with 435 delegates, Gingrich with 158 an! d Paul with 91.

They argue the discrepancy comes because several caucus states, which have already held their contests, have a separate process for officially selecting the delegates. Once those are counted, Santorum's numbers will rise in the party's count, they say.

His team also argues that Florida and Arizona â€" two states that Romney won â€" will end up awarding their delegates proportionally rather than winner-take-all. The RNC requires states holding their contests before April to award their delegates proportionally but those two states broke the party's rules by moving up their contest dates. They have already been punished by the RNC so it's unlikely they delegate distribution rules will be changed too.

It's also tough to predict in which camp those caucus state delegates will end up.

Santorum's argument comes the day of the Illinois GOP primary, where, no matter who wins the state, Romney will emerge with the most dele! gates due to Santorum's failure to field a full slate througho! ut the s tate.

Santorum repeatedly has been damaged by his own campaign operation, which failed to file a full slate of delegates in several states and thereby gave an advantage to his rivals in states that distributed their delegates proportionally. Santorum also failed to get on the ballot in Virginia.

But the former senator has vowed to stay in the race and said Monday the odds of a brokered convention this summer are "increasing."

His team echoed that theme on Tuesday.

"If this race goes to the floor of the national convention we view that as favorable terrain for Rick Santorum," the campaign's National Delegate Director John Yob said.