About the delegate counts from AP :
Beginning with the Iowa caucuses on Tuesday and continuing through the end of presidential nominating events in June, the AP will track national convention delegates for each Republican candidate. The candidate who secures the support of a majority of the 2,286 delegates to the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Fla., in August will be the party's nominee to challenge President Barack Obama in the Nov. 6 general election.
The AP calculates the number of delegates won by candidates in each primary or caucus, based on vote results and state and national party rules, and interviews unpledged delegates to learn their preferences.
Most primaries and some caucuses are binding, meaning delegates won by the candidates are pledged to support that candidate at the national conventions this summer. Political parties in some states, however, use multistep procedures to award national delegates.
Typically, such states use local caucuses to elect delegates to state or congressional district conventions, where national delegates are selected. In these states, the AP uses the results from local caucuses to calculate the number of national delegates each candidate will win, if the candidates maintain the same level of support. The AP will update delegate totals, if support for the candidates changes.
The AP compiles and counts the votes in presidential primaries and caucuses using a combination of stringers at local vote reporting sites, local and state government websites, political party websites, and electronic feeds of vote results from state election officials and/or party officials. The incoming vote reports are run through a series of quality control checks before the candidate totals are compiled and reported for each race.
