By Will Mari, SeattlePoliticore

SAN ANTONIO- It’s sunny and windy at Lions Field at San Antonio Christian School, located some 20 miles outside the city. A couple hundred high school students and a few parents fill the bleachers. Some look bored. Others look jazzed.

They’re here to support their man at this nonpartisan get-out-to-vote rally. In many places around the country, that would be Sen. Barack Obama.

But not here. This is Huckabee country.

On a small stage set up in front of the stands, Kaitlin Chapman, 18, quietly addresses her assembled peers, her hands behind her back. She cites the former Baptist minister’s faith, his commitment to family values and his strong anti-abortion stance as reasons for her support.

“I will not waste my vote on someone just because I think he’s going to win,” Chapman says.

The active Huckabee volunteer is one of six kids who take turns speaking for their candidate. Obama and Sen. Hillary Clinton have one lonely supporter each, and Sen. John McCain has a couple, but it’s Huckabee who makes the strongest showing in this part of Texas.

The Huckabee speakers are the only ones to get a response out of the teenaged crowd, with some scattered applause here and there. Parents in attendance mutter an “amen” or two, and others nod in agreement.

It feels like Chapman and her peers are preaching to the choir, and, in fact, they are — many in the crowd at least nominally support the former Arkansas governor.

One girl, addressing Huckabee’s long odds, gets people excited with a verse from the Bible: Romans 8:31, “If God is for us, who can be against us?” She declares that the United States is “God’s country,” and that Huckabee is the right man to lead it, long odds be darned.

That earns some cheers, as folks around these parts seem to like rooting for the ideological underdog.

After the speakers depart the stage, they gather to talk with friend before melting off into what’s becoming a summer-like afternoon.

The event is run by the staff of The Revelation, the school newspaper, who also mingle in little groups of two or three. Pam Lutrell is the paper’s advisor and the journalism teacher.

“This is Huckabee country,” she explains. Being an evangelical stronghold, values voters here are concerned about abortion and other traditional moral issues, and aren’t afraid to vote according to their consciences.

“They’ll vote for McCain, but they want to make a statement” on Tuesday by voting for Huckabee, she says. 

Chapman, the paper’s fashion editor, says that her and her dad were supporters of Rudy Giuliani before he dropped out after Florida. But Huckabee’s stubborn persistence in the GOP race attracted her attention, and she quickly turned her attention to him, becoming the youth liaison for the San Antonio Huckabee Meetup.com group.

With her first caucus and primary coming up on Tuesday, she’s excited to finally be able to show her support in a more tangible way, even if Huckabee loses.

“People are still skeptical of John McCain and his views,” she says. A self-identified Bible-believing Christian, she also believes her man can still influence things down the electoral road.

“I hope he’ll pass some of his view on to McCain,” she says.

Billie Stockton, 16 and a sophomore, is another Huckabee fan who spoke out on his behalf.

“A lot of us like him,” he says, identifying, like Kaitlin, Huckabee’s “Biblical principles” as the reason why he’s backing the governor.

Lutrell can name another reason.

When a candidate like Obama or Huckabee presents simple ideas well and with a sense of authenticity, that message tends to resonate with young and old alike, especially in a place like Texas, she says.

Here, in the heart of Texas, Lutrell said “Huckabee communicates beautifully.”