In 1952, Cobb was challenged for the chairmanship at the state convention by Vern Tindall of Stuttgart but again prevailed. As a delegate to the 1952 Republican National Convention in Chicago, Cobb and the Arkansas delegation voted for U.S. Senator Robert A. Taft of Ohio but quickly joined with the majority to endorse Dwight D. Eisenhower. Invited to meet with Eisenhower after the nomination, Cobb advised him not to concede a single southern state to the Democratic nominee, later Governor Adlai Stevenson II of Illinois. Cobb writes in his memoirs that Eisenhower "did not need to be sold on campaigning in the South because he already was convinced that it would be successful."