Iowa

Subterms

    More stories

    • 150 Shares139 Views

      in US Politics

      Trump called Iowa evangelicals ‘so-called Christians’ and ‘pieces of shit’, book says

      by

      In the heat of the Republican primary of 2016, Donald Trump called evangelical supporters of his rival Ted Cruz “so-called Christians” and “real pieces of shit”, a new book says.The news lands as the 2024 Republican primary heats up, two months out from the Iowa caucus and a day after Trump’s closest rival this time, the hard-right Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, was endorsed by Bob Vander Plaats, an influential evangelical leader in Iowa.The new book, The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism, by Tim Alberta, an influential reporter and staff writer for the Atlantic, will be published on 5 December. The Guardian obtained a copy.Early in the book, Alberta describes fallout from an event at Liberty University, the evangelical college in Virginia, shortly before the Iowa vote in January 2016.As candidates jockeyed for support from evangelicals, a powerful bloc in any Republican election, Trump was asked to name his favourite Bible verse.Attempting to follow the advice of Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, the thrice-married, not noticeably church-going New York billionaire and reality TV star introduced it as “Two Corinthians”, rather than “Second Corinthians”, as would have been correct.“The laughter and ridicule were embarrassing enough for Trump,” Alberta writes. “But the news of Perkins endorsing Ted Cruz, just a few days later, sent him into a spiral. He began to speculate that there was a conspiracy among powerful evangelicals to deny him the GOP nomination.“When Cruz’s allies began using the ‘Two Corinthians’ line to attack him in the final days before the Iowa caucuses, Trump told one Iowa Republican official, ‘You know, these so-called Christians hanging around with Ted are some real pieces of shit.’”Alberta adds that “in private over the coming years”, Trump “would use even more colourful language to describe the evangelical community”.Cruz won Iowa but Trump took the second primary contest, in New Hampshire, and won the nomination with ease. After beating Hillary Clinton and spending four chaotic years in the White House, he was beaten by Joe Biden in 2020.Pursuing the lie that his defeat was the result of electoral fraud, Trump refused to concede defeat. He has continued to dominate Republican politics, now as the clear frontrunner to be the nominee again.Trump has maintained that status despite having been impeached twice (the second for inciting the deadly January 6 attack on Congress) and despite facing 91 criminal charges (34 for hush-money payments to a porn star) and civil threats including a case arising from a rape allegation a judge called “substantially true”.Evangelicals remain the dominant bloc in Iowa, 55% of respondents to an NBC News/Des Moines Register poll in August identifying as “devoutly religious”. But despite his lengthy rap sheet, Trump’s hold on such voters appears to remain strong.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIn October, the Register put him at 43% support overall in Iowa, with DeSantis and the former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley 27 points behind. The same poll said 44% of evangelicals planned to make Trump their first choice, with DeSantis at 22% and Haley seven points back.Evangelicals have also stayed with Trump nationwide. According to exit polls, in the 2020 presidential election he was supported by 76% of white evangelical voters.DeSantis and Haley must attempt to catch Trump in Iowa. Vander Plaats’ endorsement was thus a sought-after prize, if one Trump did not pursue, declining to attend a Thanksgiving Family Forum Vander Plaats hosted in Des Moines last week.On Monday, announcing his decision to endorse DeSantis, the president of the Family Leader, which seeks to “inspire the church to engage government for the advance of God’s kingdom and the strengthening of family”, pointed to the conclusion he hoped his followers would reach.Speaking to Fox News, Vander Plaats said: “I don’t think America is going to elect [Trump] president again. I think America would be well served to have a choice, and I really believe Ron DeSantis should be that guy. And I think Iowa is tailor-made for him to win this.”Trump’s rivals may yet take encouragement from Register polling, should evangelicals begin to doubt Trump. In the October poll, 76% of Iowa evangelicals said they had a positive view of DeSantis, while 62% said they liked Haley. More

    • 138 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Vivek Ramaswamy Struggles to Win Over Iowans, Even With Free Meals

      by

      The political newcomer’s surge over the summer has fizzled. But Vivek Ramaswamy is still spending freely to keep up a breakneck pace in Iowa and New Hampshire.While many people were heading home for the Thanksgiving holiday, the presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy was making a new, if temporary, one in Iowa.He has rented an apartment in Des Moines, the state’s capitol, and plans to participate in the city’s annual Turkey Trot, a Thanksgiving morning run. In the five days before the holiday, Mr. Ramaswamy, 38, hosted over two dozen events, many offering free breakfast, lunch or dinner, eager to answer voter questions.At recent stops, Mr. Ramaswamy, a political newcomer and millionaire entrepreneur, has made a bold proclamation about his 2024 bid: “If I win Iowa, I’m your next president.”But his odds on either front appear to be growing more remote. He’s campaigning and spending like there’s no tomorrow, buying meals and filling Pizza Ranches with crowds willing to hear him out — but not necessarily winning them over. Stagnation has set in after a fleeting summer spike in popularity, with national polls consistently showing him bogged in the middling single digits. Aggressive debate tactics appear to have hurt him, with his disapproval numbers ticking up after each performance, though he started with little name recognition.In Iowa, he doesn’t fare much better. A recent Des Moines Register survey shows former President Donald J. Trump maintaining a dominant lead and Nikki Haley, the former ambassador to the United Nations, battling Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida for second place.And yet Mr. Ramaswamy, who has campaigned in the image of Mr. Trump, says he will hold over 200 events in Iowa between now and the caucuses on Jan. 15 after abandoning his Ohio headquarters and moving staff to Iowa and New Hampshire, as Politico reported this month. He suggests the polls don’t accurately reflect his support.“If what we are seeing in our events translates into the broader caucus-going population, we’re going to have an outstanding result here in Iowa,” he told reporters on Tuesday after speaking to a packed crowd at a Cedar Rapids restaurant.“People really dial in and start talking about this as the caucus date approaches, and so our bet is that’s going to be a bottom-up lift that we get. I truly think we’re going to end up delivering a surprise,” he added.The intensity of his schedule — several states a week, with up to six events each day, not counting frequent media appearances — is coming at what he says is great personal expense. His campaign has picked up the tab for dozens of meals at recent events. At stops attended by a New York Times reporter, representatives for the host restaurants declined to give specifics on the cost. One restaurant in Toledo, Iowa, reached by phone, put the cost at $1,000.Mr. Ramaswamy estimated to reporters Tuesday that he had spent around $20 million on his run so far. As of the end of September, his campaign had spent more than $22 million, and he had contributed more than $17 million, according to the latest filings with the Federal Election Commission.Interviews with voters who heard him speak suggested that while many were intrigued by Mr. Ramaswamy’s proposals, and liked what they heard, they weren’t quite sold with two months to go before the caucuses. Many likened him to Mr. Trump — describing him as “sharper,” “more polite” or having “less baggage.”“He’s another Trump, only a little bit younger,” said Diane Lyphout, a voter from Vinton, Iowa, who is also considering Mr. DeSantis. “He’s going to do really well. The only thing I thought he was maybe just a little bit young yet to have that seasoning and wisdom.”But aspects of Mr. Ramaswamy’s strategy — including his steadfast bolstering of Mr. Trump, who is accused of committing dozens of felonies in four criminal indictments — have baffled some voters and veterans of the Iowa caucuses.His campaign has reserved about $1 million in television ads in Iowa for November — nearly double what his campaign and a super PAC backing him spent in October, according to data from AdImpact, a media-tracking firm. But as of Tuesday evening, neither his campaign nor the super PAC had made buys for subsequent months. Mr. Trump, Ms. Haley and Mr. DeSantis, between their campaigns and super PACs backing them, have reserved millions more in Iowa TV ads through January.The hectic travel schedule has often caused delays and, at times, canceled events — alienating potential supporters.“If he can’t show up on time, he can’t be president,” said one man at a diner in Vinton, Iowa, who left before Mr. Ramaswamy, who was 30 minutes late, arrived. At that same event, a woman walked out midway through his stump speech, saying, “Hogwash,” to a campaign staff member on her way out.He has retooled his stump speech to make central his discontent with the Republican National Committee, which he has claimed doesn’t want him in the race, and has recently been prompting crowds to ask him about his foreign policy vision, an area in which his inexperience has been highlighted by Ms. Haley and other rivals. He has used those questions to highlight his closeness to Mr. Trump, while his criticism of the “R.N.C. establishment” offers echoes of Mr. Trump’s own criticisms of the party apparatus.That message resonated with Kristine Pfab, a 57-year-old from Bernard, Iowa, who said Republicans had become “just as swampy” as Democrats. But asked who she would caucus for, she said, “Probably DeSantis.” “But if I could roll Vivek and DeSantis into one person, that would be great,” she added.Jimmy Centers, a Republican strategist in Iowa, said Mr. Ramaswamy’s decision to run as a “Trump lite” candidate, in addition to the backlash for invoking Ms. Haley’s daughter recently on the debate stage, were two factors that could hurt Mr. Ramaswamy. Voters, seeing little daylight between Mr. Trump and Mr. Ramaswamy, frequently ask why he would run against the man he proclaims was the “best president of the 21st century.”“Iowans kick the tires on just about every candidate up until the very last second. Vivek enjoyed a really nice moment in late summer, early fall, and that’s not to say he can’t get it back,” Mr. Centers said. “But for right now, I think it’s really down to two races: How much will Trump win by, and will DeSantis or Haley come in second?”Mr. Ramaswamy tells voters and reporters alike that his path to victory lies in “bringing people along” — meaning potential voters who have not traditionally supported Republicans or skip elections altogether, especially younger voices.The audiences at many of his events, however, are often older and whiter. In Grinnell, Iowa, home to Grinnell College, five students at a town hall on Monday said they were Democrats who came for the spectacle of meeting a presidential candidate for the first time.Seeing Mr. Ramaswamy, they all said, had solidified their support for President Biden.“I feel like a lot of his policies are just kind of identical to a lot of Trump’s policies — he seems just kind of Trump-lite, even with how he speaks,” said Che Glenn, a 19-year-old student from New York. “I just want to know why he thinks anyone would ever consider voting for him over Trump.”Even those whom Mr. Ramaswamy has won over have expressed doubts about his ability to succeed in the Hawkeye State.“I feel that the Republican Party has gone off the rails, and he’s got the message that the party needs to return to,” said Chris Kardos, a 71-year-old from Center Point, Iowa, who plans to caucus for Mr. Ramaswamy. “Unfortunately, I face the reality that his chances of winning the nomination are not great.” More

    • 138 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      DeSantis Will Pick Up Endorsement by Bob Vander Plaats of Iowa

      by

      The endorsement by Bob Vander Plaats was long expected, but comes as Gov. Ron DeSantis has tried to build momentum heading into the Iowa caucuses in January.The influential Iowa evangelical leader Bob Vander Plaats endorsed Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida for the Republican presidential nomination on Tuesday, the second major endorsement Mr. DeSantis has picked up this month in the state.Kim Reynolds, Iowa’s popular Republican governor, announced her support two weeks ago, giving Mr. DeSantis a key surrogate in a state that will hold the first vote of the Republican primary season with its caucuses on Jan. 15.“We need to find somebody who can win in 2024,” Mr. Vander Plaats said on Tuesday on “Special Report With Bret Baier” on Fox News. “What we saw in 2022, the supposedly red wave really only happened in Florida and in Iowa. Governor DeSantis took a reliable tossup state in Florida and made it complete red.”Mr. Vander Plaats has endorsed the last three Republicans who won contested Iowa caucuses — Mike Huckabee in 2008, Rick Santorum in 2012 and Ted Cruz in 2016 — though none of them went on to win the nomination. But it is far from clear that his support will be enough to bolster Mr. DeSantis, who is trailing former President Donald J. Trump by huge margins in polls in Iowa as well as nationally.As of Tuesday, Mr. DeSantis was more than 25 points behind Mr. Trump in the FiveThirtyEight average of Iowa surveys — an enormous gap to make up in less than two months’ time. And he is barely holding on to second place over Nikki Haley.Mr. Vander Plaats did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.Mr. Vander Plaats is well known for his influence among evangelicals, who are a powerful voting bloc in Iowa and have lifted socially conservative candidates there before.He is also a divisive figure. His organization once encouraged Republican candidates to sign a pledge that included a lament that “a child born into slavery in 1860 was more likely to be raised by his mother and father in a two-parent household than was an African-American baby born after the election of the USA’s first African-American president.”The Democratic National Committee highlighted a recent report about that pledge on Friday, as several Republican candidates prepared to appear at an event with Mr. Vander Plaats.On Tuesday, a D.N.C. spokeswoman, Sarafina Chitika, said: “Vander Plaats’ endorsement should come as no surprise — both he and DeSantis share the same desire to ban abortion and rip away freedoms from millions of women. They both promoted the insulting idea that slavery somehow benefited Black families.”At the recent event, a gala on Saturday for the anti-abortion group Pulse Life Advocates, Mr. Vander Plaats said that opposition to abortion was the single most important factor in his support for a candidate.“If they are not crystal clear where they are at on the sanctity of human life, you can’t trust them on anything else,” Mr. Vander Plaats said, adding: “The sanctity of life is not something to be nuanced. It’s not something to be poll-tested. It’s not a thing where the heartbeat bill was too harsh of a thing to be passed at the state level for the state of Florida.”That comment about the “heartbeat” bill, a common conservative name for six-week abortion bans, was a clear criticism of Mr. Trump, though Mr. Vander Plaats did not name him. Mr. Trump has called the six-week ban that Mr. DeSantis signed in Florida “a terrible thing and a terrible mistake.”Mr. Trump is, more than any other Republican, responsible for the Dobbs ruling that ended Roe v. Wade and allowed such laws to take effect, as he appointed three of the Supreme Court justices who made the ruling.Mr. Trump has not courted Mr. Vander Plaats, and the former president’s supporters have been dismissive about his endorsement’s significance. A statement from the Trump campaign on Tuesday said, “While the DeSantis camp will try and spin that a Vander Plaats endorsement will revive their sputtering and shrinking campaign, cold hard data tells a much different story. These G.O.P. caucus attenders have mixed feelings about Vander Plaats, if they have any opinion at all, and no few if any are moving to vote for DeSantis because of his endorsement.”Shane Goldmacher More

    • 125 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      In Iowa, DeSantis Talks Abortion to Win Over Evangelical Voters

      by

      The Florida governor is courting white evangelicals by using Donald J. Trump’s criticisms of hard-line abortion restrictions against him.Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida paused, looked down and then told a banquet hall filled with conservative Iowa Christians something that he had never before said in public: His wife, Casey DeSantis, experienced a miscarriage several years ago during her first pregnancy.The couple, Mr. DeSantis explained on Friday at a forum for Republican presidential candidates hosted by an influential evangelical group, had been trying to conceive before taking a trip to Israel.“We went to Ruth’s tomb in Hebron — Ruth, Chapter 4, Verse 13 — and we prayed,” Mr. DeSantis, citing Scripture, said at the event in Des Moines. “We prayed a lot to have a family, and then, lo and behold, we go back to the United States and a little time later we got pregnant. But unfortunately we lost that first baby.”The deeply personal revelation — in response to a question about the importance of the nuclear family — was an unexpected moment for Mr. DeSantis, who is usually tight-lipped about both his faith and his family life. On the campaign trail, he rotates through a limited set of anecdotes about Ms. DeSantis and their three young children, as well as his religious beliefs. Still, at the Iowa event, he lingered only briefly on his wife’s miscarriage, calling it simply a “tough thing” and a test of faith.Mr. DeSantis, a Roman Catholic, is heavily courting Iowa’s religious right, which has helped deliver the state’s last three competitive Republican presidential caucuses to candidates who wore their faith on their sleeves. White evangelical voters are likely to play a decisive role in the state’s Jan. 15 caucuses, the first contest in the 2024 G.O.P. primary, and they often turn to politicians who speak the language of the church.“You have to talk authentically from the heart,” said Terry Amann, a conservative pastor from Des Moines. “Anybody can cite Bible verses.”A majority of evangelical voters in Iowa favor former President Donald J. Trump over Mr. DeSantis. But some say they fear Mr. Trump is backing off on abortion.Jordan Gale for The New York TimesIf Mr. DeSantis has any hope of beating former President Donald J. Trump, the front-runner, who leads him by roughly 30 points in Iowa polls, it lies in winning over conservative Christian voters while fending off the challenge of Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, who is seen as more moderate.A DeSantis victory in Iowa remains a long shot, but Mr. Trump’s criticisms of the hard-line abortion restrictions favored by many evangelical voters in Iowa may have created a lane for the Florida governor to bolster his standing. The former president has described a six-week abortion ban signed by Mr. DeSantis in Florida as “a terrible mistake.” Mr. Trump has blamed extreme positions on abortion for recent Republican losses at the polls and, looking to win over moderates in the general election, has avoided supporting a federal abortion ban. That has deeply disappointed some evangelical leaders and voters who cheered him after his appointments to the Supreme Court helped overturn Roe v. Wade.“Trump has backed off his pro-life position,” said Mike Demastus, who leads an evangelical church in Des Moines. “And that’s caused voters like myself to pause and be willing to listen to other candidates.”Mr. DeSantis is trying to take advantage of concerns like Mr. Demastus’s. As he opened his new Iowa campaign headquarters outside Des Moines on Saturday, the governor told reporters that Mr. Trump’s comments on abortion had been the real “mistake.” He had previously said of Mr. Trump, during an interview with an Iowa radio station, that “all pro-lifers should know that he’s preparing to sell you out.”Still, Mr. Trump remains immensely popular with conservative Christians, and not only because of his role in Roe’s demise. Mr. Trump moved the United States Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, an issue of deep importance to many evangelicals. He is also credited for his anti-immigration policies and for a strong economy during his presidency, reflecting the fact that many religious voters have political concerns beyond their faith.Even many of the evangelical voters who support Mr. DeSantis are deeply grateful to the former president.“The reversal of Roe v. Wade — I didn’t ever think that would happen in my lifetime, and he did that,” Jerry Buseman, 54, a retired school administrator from Hampton, Iowa, said of Mr. Trump.Mr. Trump and Mr. DeSantis have battled for months to win over influential evangelical leaders and top Republicans in Iowa, a state some say is still Mr. Trump’s to lose.Doug Mills/The New York TimesNow, the DeSantis and Trump campaigns are engaged in a back-and-forth to win over faith leaders and voters. Evangelicals are the single largest religious group among Iowa Republicans, accounting for more than a third of their ranks, according to Pew Research Center. So far, polls suggest Mr. Trump is winning the race for their votes. The former president had the support of 51 percent of white evangelical voters, compared with 30 percent for Mr. DeSantis, according to a September poll by CBS News and YouGov. It’s a major shift from 2016, when evangelicals flocked to Ted Cruz rather than to Mr. Trump, helping the Republican senator from Texas win the caucuses that year.“Trump has already proven himself to have a backbone,” said Brad Sherman, a pastor and state legislator who has endorsed Mr. Trump, even though he said he wished the former president would take a “stronger stand” against abortion. “He’s shown that he will do what he says.”Like Mr. Sherman, many Iowans backing Mr. Trump seem willing to forgive his more recent comments on abortion. Only 40 percent of Trump supporters agreed that he was right to criticize six-week abortion bans, according to an October poll by The Des Moines Register, NBC News and Mediacom.Alex Latcham, the Trump campaign’s early-states director, said the former president had gotten results on issues that had been “the top priorities” for evangelical voters for decades. In his Des Moines office, Mr. Latcham said, he keeps a map of Iowa showing the locations of more than 100 religious leaders who have endorsed Mr. Trump.“There’s plenty of time, but right now it’s Trump’s to lose,” said Steve Scheffler, the president of the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition, who is staying neutral through the caucuses.To counter Mr. Trump’s popularity, Mr. DeSantis held his first official campaign rally in May at a church outside Des Moines, where a group of pastors prayed over him. He has rolled out his own endorsements from more than 100 religious leaders around the state. Before each Republican presidential debate, he has invited a pastor to pray for him and his wife in the green room backstage. His campaign holds a monthly video call for pastors. And unlike Mr. Trump, he has attended several church services in Iowa, including alongside the Iowa evangelical leader Bob Vander Plaats, who hosted Mr. DeSantis at the forum where he discussed his wife’s miscarriage.Never Back Down, a super PAC supporting the DeSantis campaign, has produced advertisements that accuse Mr. Trump of a “betrayal of the pro-life movement,” call into question his support for Israel and criticize his attacks on Kim Reynolds, the popular Iowa governor who has endorsed Mr. DeSantis and has also signed a six-week abortion ban.”DeSantis has done an outstanding job networking with evangelicals,” said David Kochel, a veteran Iowa political strategist. “He’s running the campaign the right way. The problem is he’s doing it against someone who has already delivered for evangelical voters.”Ms. Haley, the other top runner-up in the race, who is now tied with Mr. DeSantis in many Iowa polls, does not appear to be pursuing the state’s faith leaders as aggressively, and her more measured way of talking about abortion has turned off many evangelicals.In Iowa, Mr. DeSantis must also fend off Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, who has become a formidable challenger for second place.Jordan Gale for The New York TimesOlivia Perez-Cubas, a spokeswoman for the Haley campaign, highlighted Ms. Haley’s “steadfast support for Israel” as a reason for evangelical voters to get behind her. And she pointed to Ms. Haley’s recent endorsement by Marlys Popma, a prominent anti-abortion activist in Iowa. For Mr. DeSantis, a lack of folksy charm may still be an issue in Iowa, despite his efforts to be more personal with evangelical voters.Evangelical voters “want to see the heart,” said Sam Brownback, a conservative Christian and former Republican senator from Kansas whose own presidential campaign failed to take off in 2008. “They want to see what you really are inside.”The last three Republicans to win contested caucuses — former Gov. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas, former Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania and Mr. Cruz — all talked easily about their faith. (None of them captured the nomination.)Mr. DeSantis, who has been criticized as stilted on the campaign trail, is not built in that mold. Instead, he is relying on his record as Florida governor, which includes, in addition to the six-week abortion ban, laws to restrict the rights of transgender people and to limit discussions of sexuality in schools.When a reporter asked why he was a better fit for Iowa’s evangelicals than Mr. Trump — a thrice-married former Democrat — Mr. DeSantis replied that he was “better representative of their values.”“I have a better record of actually delivering on my promises and fighting important fights on behalf of children, on behalf of families and on behalf of religious liberty,” he said on Saturday at a coffee shop in Ottumwa, Iowa.Heidi Sokol, 51, a Republican voter who teaches at a Christian school in Clear Lake, Iowa, said she wasn’t bothered that Mr. DeSantis spoke far more about policy than about his personal faith when she saw him speak at a Des Moines church this fall.“We’re not hiring the president to be our pastor,” Ms. Sokol said.Ruth Igielnik More

    • 163 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Trump Focuses on Iowa as He Looks to Close Out the Republican Race

      by

      The former president has made Iowa his priority, hoping to thin the field and turn his attention to a campaign against President Biden.With just under two months until the Iowa caucuses, former President Donald J. Trump on Saturday returned to the state and made explicit a campaign strategy that he had only hinted at for months.Speaking in a crowded high school gym, Mr. Trump made clear that he saw a decisive victory in the first Republican nominating contest as the swiftest path to end the Republican primary and focus on a general election race against President Biden.“You know, we have to send a great signal,” Mr. Trump said. Referring to his Republican rivals, he added, “And then maybe these people say, ‘OK, it’s over now.’”After his speech concluded, Mr. Trump also made a departure from his normal rally routine. The former president, who has largely eschewed the retail politicking characteristic of the state, stuck around for roughly 10 minutes to pose for pictures and shake voters’ hands.Mr. Trump’s speech, which covered issues including energy, foreign policy and criminal justice with an Iowa frame, suggested a subtle shift in his campaign’s approach to the Republican primary. For months Mr. Trump has appeared at small “commit to caucus” events, which his campaign hopes will ensure that his popularity in the state propels him to victory in January, pushing out most of the field.Still, Mr. Trump — who is the front-runner in the Republican primary in both polls and fund-raising — has maintained a fairly light campaign schedule in Iowa.His challengers, who lag far behind, have barnstormed the state, hoping that a strong showing could weaken Mr. Trump’s foothold and give them a path to the Republican nomination.On Saturday, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who has staked his campaign on the state, opened a new Iowa campaign headquarters outside Des Moines. He was joined by Iowa’s popular Republican governor, Kim Reynolds, who recently endorsed him.Ms. Reynolds, who previously pledged to stay neutral in the caucuses, praised Mr. DeSantis and said that Iowa caucusgoers “expect you to show up, they expect you to earn their votes,” in an apparent dig at Mr. Trump.But speaking in Fort Dodge, Mr. Trump projected confidence. He relied on a tactic that seemed to reflect his transactional approach to politics: recounting to Iowans what he did for them as president and asking them to return the favor.At one point, he took credit for keeping their caucuses the first presidential nominating contest, in contrast with Democrats, who shifted Iowa later in their nominating calendar.“Look, I kept you first in the nation,” he said. “I’m the one that — will you please give me a good show, at least, out of it? OK? Please.”Mr. Trump reaffirmed his commitment to ethanol, which is important to Iowa’s economy. And as he often does here, he repeatedly touted the $28 billion in aid his administration provided to farmers, money that he has said came from tariffs on China. Mr. Trump suggested that those funds alone should secure him a win in January.“My guys say: ‘Please, sir, don’t take it for granted that you’re going to win Iowa. It doesn’t sound good,’” Mr. Trump told the crowd. “I say to them, ‘Of course it does. I got them $28 billion. Who the hell else would you vote for?’”But even as he said Iowans’ support in the caucuses was crucial, Mr. Trump made clear that he was already looking ahead to a general election race against President Biden.Citing Mr. Biden’s meeting with President Xi Jinping of China, he accused the president of being corrupted by Chinese influence and too soft on the country.“We have a Manchurian candidate in the Oval Office,” Mr. Trump said, apparently referring to the 1962 film about a Communist sleeper agent in the U.S. government. The reference did not seem to resonate with the crowd.“You know, ‘The Manchurian Candidate’?” Mr. Trump continued. “Go check it out.”In another riff on his usual stump speech, Mr. Trump accused Democrats of conducting a witch hunt with their investigations of him, bringing up the so-called Steele dossier, which contained a salacious claim about his encounters with prostitutes in Moscow’s Ritz-Carlton hotel.Mr. Trump lamented that he had to explain to his wife, Melania, accusations that he instructed the prostitutes to urinate on each other and the bed in the hotel, where President Barack Obama had once slept.“Actually, that one she didn’t believe, because she said: ‘He’s a germaphobe. He’s not into that, you know?’” Mr. Trump said. “‘He’s not into golden showers,’ as they say they call that.” He shook his head. “I don’t like that idea. No, I didn’t.”Nicholas Nehamas More

    • 63 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      Can Nikki Haley Beat Trump?

      by

      It’s time to admit that I underestimated Nikki Haley.When she began her presidential campaign, she seemed caught betwixt and between: too much of a throwback to pre-Trump conservatism to challenge Ron DeSantis for the leadership of a Trumpified party, but also too entangled with Trump after her service in his administration to offer the fresh start that anti-Trump Republicans would be seeking.If you wanted someone to attack Trump head-on with relish, Chris Christie was probably your guy. If you wanted someone with pre-Trump Republican politics but without much Trump-era baggage, Tim Scott seemed like the fresher face.But now Scott is gone, Christie has a modest New Hampshire constituency and not much else, and Haley is having her moment. She’s in second place in New Hampshire, tied with DeSantis in the most recent Des Moines Register-led poll in Iowa, and leading Joe Biden by more than either DeSantis or Trump in national polls. Big donors are fluttering her way, and there’s an emerging media narrative about how she’s proving the DeSantis campaign theory wrong and showing that you can thrive as a Republican without surrendering to Trumpism.To be clear, I do not think Haley has proved the DeSantis theory wrong. She is not polling anywhere close to the highs DeSantis hit during his stint as the Trump-slayer, and if you use the Register-led poll to game out a future winnowing, you see that her own voters would mostly go to DeSantis if she were to drop out — but if DeSantis drops out, a lot of his voters would go to Trump.As long as that’s the case, Haley might be able to consolidate 30 or 35 percent of the party, but the path to actually winning would be closed. Which could make her ascent at DeSantis’s expense another study in the political futility of anti-Trump conservatism, its inability to wrestle successfully with the populism that might make Trump the nominee and the president again.But credit where it’s due: Haley has knocked out Scott, passed Christie and challenged DeSantis by succeeding at a core aspect of presidential politics — presenting yourself as an appealing and charismatic leader who can pick public fights and come out the winner (at least when Vivek Ramaswamy is your foil).So in the spirit of not underestimating her, let’s try to imagine a scenario where Haley actually wins the nomination.First, assume that ideological analysis of party politics is overrated, and that a candidate’s contingent success can yield irresistible momentum, stampeding voters in a way that polls alone cannot anticipate.For Haley, the stampede scenario requires winning outright in New Hampshire. The difficulty is that even on the upswing, she still trails Trump 46-19 in the current RealClearPolitics Average. But assume that Christie drops out and his support swings her way, assume that the current polling underestimates how many independents vote in the G.O.P. primary, assume a slight sag for Trump and a little last-moment Nikkimentum, and you can imagine your way to a screaming upset — Haley 42, Trump 40.Then assume that defeat forces Trump to actually debate in the long February lull (broken only by the Nevada caucus) between New Hampshire and the primary in Haley’s own South Carolina. Assume that the front-runner comes across as some combination of rusty and insane, Haley handles him coolly and then wins her home state primary. Assume that polls still show her beating Biden, Fox News has rallied to her fully, endorsements flood in — and finally, finally, enough voters who like Trump because he’s a winner swing her way to clear a path to the nomination.You’ll notice, though, that this story skips over Iowa. That’s because I’m not sure what Haley needs there. Victory seems implausible, but does she want to surge so impressively that it knocks DeSantis out of the race? Or, as the Dispatch’s Nick Catoggio has suggested, does the fact that DeSantis’s voters mostly have Trump as a second choice mean that Haley actually needs DeSantis to stay in the race through the early states, so that Trump can’t consolidate his own potential support? In which case maybe Haley needs an Iowa result where both she and DeSantis overperform their current polling, setting her up for New Hampshire but also giving the Florida governor a reason to hang around.This dilemma connects to my earlier argument that beating Trump requires a joining of the Haley and DeSantis factions, an alliance of the kind contemplated by Trump’s opponents in 2016 but never operationalized. But I doubt Haley is interested in such an alliance at the moment; after all, people are talking about her path to victory — and here I am, doing it myself!Fundamentally, though, I still believe that Haley’s destiny is anticipated by the biting, “congrats, Nikki,” quote from a DeSantis ally in New York Magazine: “You won the Never Trump primary. Your prize is nothing.”The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTOpinion) and Instagram. More

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      Nikki Haley Says She Doesn’t Agree With Trump ‘Vermin’ Comments

      by

      Her reaction, which came six days after the former president first made the remarks, came in response to a question from one of her supporters while campaigning in Iowa.Nikki Haley, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations who is rising in the polls in the Republican presidential race, criticized former President Donald J. Trump for vowing to root out his political opponents like “vermin.”“I don’t agree with that statement,” Ms. Haley said at a town-hall event in Newton, Iowa. “Any more than I agree when he said Hezbollah was smart, or any more than I agree when he hit Netanyahu when his country was on its knees after all that brutality.”Ms. Haley’s response, which came six days after Mr. Trump made the remarks at a Veterans Day address in Claremont, N.H., was prompted by a question from Daniel Beintema, 63, a supporter of Ms. Haley who was concerned about the spread of “hate and division” and how little attention Mr. Trump’s comments received from Republican officials.Mr. Trump’s rhetoric — particularly the use of the word “vermin” — was condemned by President Biden’s campaign and other Democrats, as well as by historians, for its echoes with the dehumanizing rhetoric wielded by fascist dictators like Hitler and Benito Mussolini.“When somebody that’s a leader in the Republican Party uses words of divisiveness and hatred, calling people vermin — and just because they oppose what you’re doing or where they come from, who they are,” Mr. Beintema said in an interview after the event. “And the Republican Party backed away from that, like, ‘Well, I’m not going to make a comment on that.’ I think that’s important.”The town-hall exchange reflected the careful criticism of Mr. Trump that has seeped into Ms. Haley’s stump speeches on the campaign trail. She has focused on the former president’s mercurial and scandal-prone nature, something she says would be a liability both for Republicans at the polls and in the Oval Office.“You look at the elections from last week or two weeks ago, we lost again. That’s chaos,” Ms. Haley said speaking to voters on Friday. She added: “We can’t have the world on fire and be dealing with chaos. We just can’t. We won’t survive it.”The critical comments also come as Ms. Haley is surging in the polls in Iowa and other early voting states. Voters who plan to caucus for her in Iowa have said it is because of her foreign policy experience, her strong performance in the debates and her commitment to speaking what she calls “hard truths.”“She is willing to not avoid tough subjects that are going to potentially offend people who would show up for her,” said Mark Timmerman, 62, a resident of Clive, Iowa, who traveled to see Ms. Haley in Ankeny on Friday. “She will tell the truth.” More

    • 125 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Haley Tussles With DeSantis, Aiming to Prove Herself in Iowa

      by

      Nikki Haley is vying for a matchup with Donald Trump in her home state. The calculus is similar for Ron DeSantis, who has stepped up his attacks on his rival for second place.For most of the 2024 presidential cycle, Nikki Haley has ceded ground in Iowa to Donald J. Trump, who dominates its polls, and to Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who has made the state central to his hopes of besting the Republican front-runner.But Ms. Haley, who has focused more energy on the primaries in New Hampshire and her home state of South Carolina where she served as governor, is sending strong signals that she still intends to make it a fight.With just two months to go before the critical first-in-the-nation caucuses, Ms. Haley, the former ambassador to the United Nations, is starting a series of campaign events Thursday as her battle with Mr. DeSantis to become Mr. Trump’s nearest rival reaches a fever pitch. She will arrive armed with more than 70 new endorsements in the state and plans for a $10 million advertising blitz across Iowa and New Hampshire, seeking to capitalize on the narrowing field and the polls that show her steady rise.“She is peaking at the right time,” said Chris Cournoyer, a state senator and Ms. Haley’s Iowa state chairwoman. “Right now.”Yet Mr. DeSantis has had a strong head start in Iowa. He has pursued an all-in strategy in the state for months, building what appears to be a formidable ground game and moving much of his staff to the state in a last-ditch attempt to win the Jan. 15 caucuses. Before the third presidential debate last week in Miami, he landed a major victory when he drew the endorsement of Gov. Kim Reynolds, who said there was “too much at stake” to remain neutral in the primary nomination, as Iowa governors typically do.And then there is Mr. Trump himself. Ms. Haley’s turn toward the state appears to be confirmation of what Mr. DeSantis and others have been signaling from the onset: For another candidate to have a shot, Mr. Trump must be stopped in Iowa first.As their competition for second place heats up, Ms. Haley and Mr. DeSantis have been clashing on the debate stage and in mailers, online posts and media appearances. The two have lobbed misleading claims at each other in recent weeks on dealings with Chinese companies and energy. Mr. DeSantis in particular has ramped up the attacks, seeking to use Ms. Haley’s own appeal to a broader coalition of voters against her by casting her as too liberal. The tone of the attacks has also escalated.He has falsely characterized Ms. Haley’s position on Gazan refugees, and criticized her for saying that social media users should be forbidden from posting anonymously. (On Wednesday, after some online backlash from right-wing media commentators, Ms. Haley clarified on CNBC that she had been referring solely to foreign-based actors.)In a radio interview on Tuesday, Mr. DeSantis dug up a three-year-old post in which Ms. Haley said that the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police should be “personal and painful for everyone.” Mr. DeSantis, who at the time said he was “appalled” by Mr. Floyd’s death, questioned her sentiments, saying “Why does that need to be personal and painful for you or me? We had nothing to do with it.”Ms. Haley has not humored such strikes with a response, and when asked about criticism from her rivals, she has sought to project strength. “When I’m attacked, I kick back,” she has warned.They are not the only ones competing for better positioning. Vivek Ramaswamy, the entrepreneur and political newcomer who has mostly self-funded his campaign, has made 150 Iowa stops, 34 more than Mr. DeSantis and more than double those by Ms. Haley. He has attempted to make inroads with Indian American voters in the state. And his campaign officials on Wednesday said they would be spending more on advertising and expanding their staff there soon. He released a list of more than 20 Iowa events through next week.Iowa is a difficult state to survey partly because turnout is difficult to predict and the number of swing voters who show up to caucus can be higher than expected. But a Des Moines Register/NBC News/Mediacom Iowa poll released at the end of last month captured Ms. Haley and Mr. DeSantis tied for second place at 16 percent, far behind Mr. Trump, who pulled in 43 percent support among likely Republican caucusgoers. It has been consistent with her steady rise in other surveys of the early voting states.Gloria Mazza, the chairwoman of the Republican Party of Polk County, which is the largest in the state and includes Des Moines, said Ms. Haley still had plenty of opportunity to catch up to other candidates who have spent more time in the state.“There are a lot of people undecided,” said Ms. Mazza, who is staying neutral. “There are still people who they won’t even disclose to polls who they are going for.”Through the early days of the election cycle, Republican voters and elected officials in Iowa said they saw little of Ms. Haley. She was polling in the single digits and lagging behind her rivals on fund-raising, making it difficult to campaign in a rural state that requires more time and money to cover ground. But her campaign has been gradually adding staff and building out her Iowa footprint since the summer. Last month, her Iowa team added two new members: Hooff Cooksey, Governor Reynolds’s campaign manager during her 2018 run, and Troy Bishop, the 2022 field director for Senator Chuck Grassley.Before the most recent Republican debate in Miami, a group of Iowa farmers and agricultural leaders announced their support for Ms. Haley’s bid, citing her tough talk on China, stances on renewable energy and pledges to repeal government regulations. On Tuesday, she released a slate of more than 70 endorsements from elected officials and community and business leaders.In interviews, Ms. Cournoyer and some Haley endorsers argued that though much of Mr. Trump’s support in Iowa is unmovable, Ms. Haley had the chance to make up ground with independents and moderates. Bob Brunkhorst, a former state senator and former mayor of Waverly on that list, said her team had been astute about not spending too much early in the cycle and waiting to expand in the state.“They know how the game is run,” he said, “and when to peak.”On Monday, Ms. Haley’s campaign announced it would be spending $10 million in television, radio and digital advertising in Iowa and New Hampshire starting in the first week of December — its first investment in advertising of the cycle and an amount so far outpacing the DeSantis campaign in the coming months.In a press call the next day, Mark Harris, the lead strategist for Stand for America, the super PAC backing Ms. Haley, said the PAC had been helping level the playing field for her in Iowa. (Mr. DeSantis’s allied super PAC, Never Back Down, has invested roughly $17.7 million in the state covering this year and into January, and Stand for America has committed $13.6 million, according to AdImpact, a media-tracking firm.) He projected further growth and contended the DeSantis campaign had backed itself into a corner.“We have our eggs in multiple baskets,” Mr. Harris said.But Andrew Romeo, the DeSantis campaign’s communications director, countered that Ms. Haley’s ad buy amounted to “lighting money on fire,” and paled in comparison to having a network of staff members and volunteers who can mobilize voters on caucus day. “History shows the Iowa caucus cannot be bought on TV ads alone and that a strong ground game is what ultimately matters,” Mr. Romeo said in a statement.Mr. DeSantis’s campaign and an allied super PAC have been pouring resources into building just that. The campaign has shifted roughly 20 employees to the state from its headquarters in Tallahassee, Fla., including three top aides. The candidate himself has made pit stops at gas stations, diners and county fairs across Iowa, so far visiting all but seven of its 99 counties, with plans to hit the rest soon. More than 40 state legislators have endorsed Mr. DeSantis, who has secured at least one local chair in each Iowa county. This week, Ms. Reynolds cut an ad promoting her endorsement of her fellow governor.And Never Back Down says it has secured commitments from nearly 30,000 Iowans to caucus for Mr. DeSantis, signed up almost 20,000 volunteers and knocked on more than 633,000 doors. In a Nov. 6 memo sent to donors, Mr. DeSantis’s team said it soon expects to have nearly 50 paid staffers across “more than six offices” statewide between the campaign and super PAC. More