More than nine months before the Iowa caucuses, eight proclaimed candidates and potential presidential candidates came to a gathering of Christian conservatives on Saturday night to test their questions. pre-recorded video?
The answer was almost certainly yes.
The audio didn’t exactly match the video of former President Donald J. Trump’s recorded message. It was done in a hurry to fit in the last ten minute window.
But the welcome given to a man who was not there – and according to whom New NBC News Poll It has the support of nearly 70% of Republican primary voters — markedly different from the applause given to those supported.
Their strategy seemed straightforward: avoiding a confrontation with a better-known and well-funded frontrunner, Trump’s attack on Ron, Florida Governor Ron, who ranks second in most Republican polls. Hope to oust, or at least overthrow, DeSantis and expect an outside force.
Then it’s everyone’s game.
Billionaire entrepreneur and author Vivek Ramaswamy said in an interview that he did not name the former president, but said, “I think this race will quickly decide me and Donald Trump.” “For people like you who are tracking the present, it may sound strange, but if you’re going to see where the pack is going, there’s an outsider craving.”
Conservatives in Iowa who attended an event on Saturday vowed to be open to a Republican candidate not named Trump. They munched on Chick-fil-A sandwiches, listened attentively, and spoke intently about politics eight years after his last Republican presidential election in Iowa.
“I love watching them put up a fight,” said Dan Applegate, former co-chair of the Republican Dallas County, Iowa.
Former Vice President Mike Pence made an appearance and was greeted like a celebrity by potential voters. South Carolina Republican Senator Tim Scott, former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson, and radio personality Larry Elder. , former Texas Rep. Will Hurd, and Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard. A gadfly turned conservative, a businessman named Perry Johnson.
In fact, Johnson was the only speaker to challenge the front-runner by name, closing his remarks. And although I don’t understand it, each one is his own.
Otherwise, applicants simply wanted to avoid candidates who chose not to come in person.
“It’s about delivering a message that resonates and recognizing that you want a better tomorrow than yesterday.
Early in the race, very early. In April 2015, two months before Trump stepped down the escalator in his tower to declare his candidacy, people gathered at the same Faith and Freedom forum to say what was about to hit them. I didn’t know at all. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida warned of the threat of Islamic jihadist displacement. Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky agonized over the common core, a long-forgotten concern about the nationalization of school curricula.
Texas Senator Ted Cruz vehemently opposed the Supreme Court, who was one vote behind to order small businesses to serve gay couples. Meanwhile, former Texas Governor Rick Perry boasted that under his leadership, his state ended abortion 20 weeks after him. It would be seen as the height of his GOP cowardice after Roe v. Wade.
When Trump comes on board, these issues will be swept away by Trump’s unique character politics and badmouthing.
This time, potential candidates knew exactly what they were up against, but didn’t address it. Penalized for using inappropriate pronouns. While preaching his trademark optimism and unity, Mr. Scott warned that “Left Radicals are selling the drug of the victim and the drug of despair.”
Ramaswamy has privately suggested that voters of true faith can see through the religious traps Mr. Trump has envisioned, attended media outlets Mr. DeSantis deems ideologically hostile, He accused DeSantis of refusing to speak on a college campus. In public, he was far off when he said conservatives shouldn’t be sitting across the negotiating table from China’s supreme leader, Xi Jinping, if they can’t visit college campuses. and refused to give his name.
Trump was able to give the audience what they wanted. Overthrow of Roe v. Wade – “no one thought it would happen” – hailed the most anti-abortion presidency ever hunt down the radical zealots and Marxists who infiltrated the He concluded, “The left-wing gender madness being foisted upon our children is an act of child abuse and will stop immediately.”
It went well. Paul his Thurmond, 65, from Des Moines, chatted and shook hands with former Vice President Pence in a friendly manner as he moved from table to table. But Thurmond, although he said he was open-minded, clearly liked Trump.
“I think Pence is too nice for now. The Democrats won’t be able to fight the evil that’s befalling him,” he said.
