As politicians and Republican Party officials tossed out the red meat Saturday at an event at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, Wayne Johnson, a 70-year-old farmer and financial consultant from Forest City, Iowa, had some thoughts calmer about the next president. would like to see
Violence in America’s schools and public places, tribalism in politics, the negativity of the nation’s elected officials: “If a leader can lead us in a positive direction, people will follow,” Mr. Johnson.
His wife, Gloria, intervened. “I don’t really care about people’s sexual habits and I don’t want to hear about it all the time,” she said, exasperated by her party’s focus on social issues such as transgender and LGBTQ care. rights “Politicians are taking stances on ‘wokeness’ that have more to do with sex than promoting our country in a positive way.”
The event, dubbed the “Roast and Ride,” an annual political rally featuring motorcycles and barbecues sponsored by Iowa’s junior Republican Sen. Joni Ernst, highlighted divisions in the party, with some attendees focusing on issues and the tone of the pocket and others looking for a candidate who will face the Democrats from the social and cultural front.
Saturday’s meeting featured eight presidential hopefuls, prominent and obscure, declared and undeclared. Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida; Mike Pence, the former vice president who will officially announce his candidacy on Wednesday; Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina; and Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina and ambassador to the United Nations, were there, along with hundreds of Iowa Republicans who will vote in the first ballots of the Republican nomination season in February.
Politicians had their arguments, waltzing across a stage bedecked with flags and stacked with hay bales to rail against “deep state” bureaucrats, “woke” corporations and liberals indoctrinating and confusing America’s children. His main target, not surprisingly, was President Biden, for all kinds of failures, from Afghanistan and the southern border to transgender athletes competing in women’s sports.
For the presidential hopefuls, winning over Iowa Republicans, with their strong religious leanings and tradition of political engagement, is the first essential step in unseating the GOP’s favorite for the nomination, Donald J. Trump , the only major candidate to do so. not make the trip on Saturday.
The attending candidates tried to differentiate themselves from each other.
The next president, assured Mr. Pence, “will hear from heaven and heal this earth.”
Ms. Haley agreed: “We need to leave the baggage and negativity behind.”
Mr. DeSantis chose a culture war analogy, evoking Winston Churchill, who once vowed to fight Nazi Germany on the beaches, on the landing grounds, in the fields and in the streets. Mr. DeSantis vowed Saturday to fight “woke ideology” in the halls of Congress and in boardrooms, saying, “We will never give up.”
Iowa has moved more decisively from swing state to deep red than perhaps any other state, voting for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012, only to move firmly to Mr. Trump in 2016 and 2020. The victory of Mr. Trump’s eight percentage point lead there in 2020 nearly matched Mr. Trump’s nine-point margin. Obama 12 years earlier.
But the voters in the audience did not have the same priorities, interests or solutions. A Republican presidential beauty pageant eight months before the Iowa caucuses will attract only the most ardent supporters, and the candidates understand that they are reaching the fringes of their party, not the center.
Many voters expressed concern about the economy, especially inflation, an issue that most presidential candidates barely touched on. Ron Greiner, a health insurance salesman from Omaha, was outraged that neither candidate had mentioned the Affordable Care Act, once a reliable target of Republican attacks, or health care.
And while Ms. Johnson may be tired of all the talk about transgender issues, others jumped to their feet when Ms. Haley called transgender women competing in women’s sports “the most important issue for women in the our days”.
Jackson Cox, a 17-year-old who will vote for the first time in 2024, drove from Albert Lea, Minn., to hear the candidates he will choose. Most important to him are taxpayer dollars that he said are being wasted before they reach American troops fighting for freedom in Ukraine; never mind that no US troops are fighting in Ukraine. Contrary to the conservative consensus, he argued that the United States should do more, not less, for Ukraine.
Diane Bebb, 66, of New London, Iowa, worried about inflation, gas and food prices and “help-need signals” for jobs that apparently couldn’t be filled.
“We could start producing oil again, to help the economy and bring prices down,” she said, though she wasn’t sure how much more oil exploration would fill all those vacancies.
His twin sister, Dione Cornelius of Bagley, Iowa, stepped in to reject the idea of filling the workforce with more immigrants.
“They’re taking all the benefits, free health care and all that kind of stuff,” Mrs. Cornelius protested.
Mike Clark, 74, a semi-retired acoustics consultant, worried that “the rule of law is disappearing,” not so much from crime on the country’s streets, but from an FBI and Justice Department out of control that pursue Mr. Trump.
“A big push for single government, that’s what worries me the most,” said Mr. Clark, referring to a common theme of conspiracy theories. He recommended the book “The Creature From Jekyll Island,” which pushes conspiracy theories about the founding of the Federal Reserve.
Amid this cornucopia of concerns, the one issue that seemed to be most widely felt was the porous border with Mexico. “What are we going to do with all these people?” asked Karen Clark, 81, of Des Moines.
Beyond that, Iowa conservatives seemed torn. They admitted that unemployment was so low that jobs in the state were not being filled, but they claimed that the economy was a disaster.
Bill Dunton, 68, said he had been coming from his home in Toledo, Iowa, to Ms. Ernst’s Roast and Ride on his Harley-Davidson. Her credit card debt was about to be paid off, she said with relief. He was especially proud of the Chevy Silverado High Country diesel pickup he bought in 2021, which was “built to be pulled.”
But, he said with conviction, “the economy has been blown to pieces,” using an expletive to describe it.
Mr Dunton also spoke of his ordeal with Covid-19, hospitalized for 28 days on large tanks of supplemental oxygen, to which he was still attached a month and a half after his discharge. However, he added: “I think we overreacted” to the pandemic.
Responding to the multiplicity of ailments on the minds of Iowans will pose a challenge for presidential hopefuls. But after the program, Mr. Johnson said he was impressed with his picks and will have time to see how the race plays out.
“It’s a long way,” he noted. “Time has a way of revealing the truth.”
