GOPers speak at IA Reagan Day dinner
Posted: Sunday, October 28, 2007 5:14 PM by Mark Murray
Filed Under:
Republicans
From NBC/NJ's Adam Aigner-TreworgyDES MOINES, IA -- Iowa’s GOP faithful filed into the Hyvee Hall here last night for the state’s Reagan Day Dinner, which featured speeches from most of the party’s presidential candidates. Notably absent were
McCain and
Giuliani, the two candidates often thought to have the hardest road to success in the Iowa caucuses.
The mostly decided crowd came wearing stickers in support of their favorite candidate, and many left after the candidates finished speaking -- skipping the anti-climactic keynote address from GOPAC Chairman Michael Steele.
The speaker thought by many to have given the best speech of the night was Huckabee, who went second to last and touted his ability to beat the Clinton political machine as evidenced by four successful gubernatorial elections in Arkansas. “I’m often asked, ‘Do you think you can win, particularly against Hillary?,’” he said. “Folks, may I suggest to you I’ve been battling against the headwinds of Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton’s political machine in Arkansas more than anybody else running for president. I didn’t just win once, not twice, not three times, but four times in a statewide election against the Clinton political machine. Bill Clinton and Hillary campaigned against me every time I ever ran, and I won and they didn’t.”
Huckabee used the same rhetoric on CNN’s Late Edition the next morning, saying that Arkansas is overwhelmingly “outfitted” with “Clintonistas,” and he is the only candidate in the race that has beaten the Clinton machine.
Bonnie Hall, who represents Iowa’s 4th District on the state’s GOP board, said that Huckabee had growing support among caucusgoers, whom she called true “conservatives.” The competition for Iowa’s conservative vote was between Huckabee and Thompson, Hall said, but to win Iowa a candidate has to work hard, and the candidate currently working the hardest -- Romney -- could shake up the race.
Thompson, who worked the crowd for more than 30 minutes during the dinner and received a better response on the floor than on the podium, closed the candidates’ portion of the night by emphasizing his campaign’s new anti-illegal immigration plan, which was introduced in Tampa last week. He called illegal immigration a “matter of national security.”
“We are apprehending, over a period of time, thousands of people who are from state sponsors of terrorism,” Thompson said, avoiding specifics. “[That] doesn’t mean they are terrorists, it just means that we don’t know.”
Then Thompson launched into a condemnation of sanctuary cities, which his campaign has positioned as a veiled attack on both Romney and Giuliani -- due to their governance of two so-called sanctuary cities, Cambridge, MA and New York, NY.
Romney appeared before the crowd via video, but he sent his wife Ann to introduce him. During the introduction, Mrs. Romney said that she often tells supporters, “I wish I could take you and put you in my back pocket and introduce you to the people of Iowa,” after which her husband apologized for his absence and once again told voters that Republicans can’t beat Democrats by acting like them.
