August 2015

If you didn’t know any better, you might have thought Tom Harkin was Bernie Sanders’ surrogate speaker at Progress Iowa’s Corn Feed event on Sunday. Actually, scratch that – you might have concluded that Harkin was using his speech to push Sanders to the left. To a crowd of a couple hundred, Harkin laid out…

Endorsements are a complicated issue. For one thing, there is always an open question about if endorsements matter. (Is anyone really swayed by the fact that Lil B has endorsed Bernie Sanders?) Additionally, there is a concern about why someone would choose to endorse; if there’s quid involved for the quo. In Iowa, these concerns…

Bernie Sanders knows he has a problem. Despite all the national momentum, the massive crowds he turns out from coast to coast and his 400,000 small-dollar donors, the former independent has been hitting a ceiling of support lately. While he’s pulled ahead of Clinton in neighboring New Hampshire, he remains stuck in the 25%-30% in…

For a moment on Wednesday at the DMACC Ankeny campus, an Iowa Democrat attending Hillary Clinton’s rural policy roll-out could have felt like they were back in 1998, with Clinton and Tom Vilsack sharing a campaign stage. And as Vilsack delivered a graceful, touching homage to his friend running for president, one could wonder if…

If you’ve watched a full Donald Trump “speech” before, you know his stream-of-consciousness style can be hard to follow. Bouncing around like a pinball from topic to topic, Trump occasionally lands on an applause line, while other times he goes for long stretches without making much sense. However, if you listen closely and parse out…

While Hillary Clinton faces email questions, Bernie Sanders draws large crowds but also protests and Donald Trump dominates every headline, Martin O’Malley has been diligently working the Iowa campaign trail. Since his announcement at the end of May, he’s been in Iowa more than any other Democrat. This week his campaign looks to show off…

Scott Walker’s harsh talk today on Chinese President Xi Jinping may be aimed at positioning himself as a tough negotiator in American-Chinese relations, but it could end up hurting his relations on a more pressing political front: Iowa and its Governor, Terry Branstad. After the Dow experienced a 3.6% drop today following a major fall…

After 11 days, 21 presidential candidates and a whole lot of pork chops-on-a-sticks eaten, the 2015 Iowa State Fair has (sadly) come to a close. It will likely be remembered as the most political caucus Fair for some time, with every legitimate candidate save for Rand Paul showing up. Team Starting Line was on hand…

Speaking on a Saturday at the State Fair usually ensures a good-sized audience to listen to you as the high weekend attendance helps bring in some on-lookers. It also, however, seems to be a prime day for organized protests. The first three Soapbox speakers on Saturday – Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, Chris Christie and Bobby Jindal –…

Of all the Republican candidates to visit the Iowa State Fair this week, John Kasich certainly stood out in his speech at the Soapbox. Speaking inside to a decent-sized crowd of about 150 (the Soapbox, which he chose not to stand on, was moved inside due to threat of bad storms), Kasich left the red…