The Board is now posting with the new bios chip installed that Asus support sent.
Couple notes:
1. Take a picture up close of the bios chip before removing it. This is a good reference on making sure the chip is in the right way, (there's writing on the chip). You'll need needle-nose pliers.
2. After you power it up, don't press F2 right away, the system factory defaulted the bios which required a couple reboots on its own. I'll admit this may have been from when I was initially troubleshooting the board with my Rome chip. Eventually the system will post and you can enter the bios.
My take away from all of this is to escalate the case with Asus support. Asus support is so used to having people send in their boards for bent pins, etc. I'm glad they were eventually able to assist me with this but sending in my brand new board and then receiving a refurbished board with a really old bios is not in my opinion a great resolution. So if they ask you to send in your brand new board, ask to have the case escalated.
Installing the Bios chip took less than 5 minutes but I've been working on this issue since early June with countless back and forth emails with tech support. I was tempted to buy a chip off ebay but without knowing the source, I just didn't want to risk it.
I hope this info helps.