‘Get ready’ for Trump run, big Iowa presence in White House if he wins
SIOUX CITY
Former President Donald Trump, speaking for more than an hour on a windswept Sioux City airfield, gave every indication that he will make a third run for the presidency in 2024.
“In order to make our country successful and safe and glorious,” Trump said Thursday night at the Sioux City Gateway Airport. “I will very, very, very probably do it again.”
The Republican quickly added, to cheers from a generally shivering crowd on the 40-degree night, “Get ready. That’s all I’m telling you. Get ready.”
During his remarks Trump made it clear Iowa will play a big role in the likely presidential bid.
He referenced advisor Eric Branstad, son of former Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad, and Iowa Republican Party Chairman Jeff Kaufmann, suggesting both would serve in a Trump White House in 2025. He did not specify positions.
Then there is the matter of the vice presidency.
Trump stood on the stage and sang the praises of Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, already on most pundits short lists as a running mate for any GOP candidate for the presidency, and certainly Trump.
“I absolutely think she would be a great vice presidential candidate,” said Carroll County Republican Party Chairman Craig Williams. “I hope she doesn’t do it because I think she is a fantastic governor and I’d hate to lose her.”
The event also served as an attempt to boost U.S. Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who is facing his strongest Democratic challenger in decades-long career in retired Admiral Mike Franken, a Sioux Center native now living in Sioux City.
Grassley is 89 years old and has served in elective office since the Eisenhower administration, having been elected to the Iowa Legislature in 1958.
“He looks like he’s 40,” Trump said. “He’s helped me more than just about anybody.”
Several rallygoers held green signs with “Farmers For Trump” slogans. Grassley wore a green-and-yellow John Deere hat and joined Trump on the stage.
“I’m not going to give up on my investigation of Hunter Biden. Grassley said, earning some of the most sustained applause in his remarks, with the dig at President Joe Biden’s son.
Paul Earnest, 67, of Lincoln, Nebraska, made a two-hour drive to see Trump in Sioux City.
“Donald Trump started saying the same things that I have been saying since I was a long-haired, pony-tailed teen-ager growing up in California,” Earnest said.
A Republican, Earnest said he expects to Trump run again.
“I believe that he did a good job.” Earnest said. “I’m not a pop culture guy so I was not enamored with him — from ‘you’re fired’ and all that.”
Shelly Bird, 62, of Sergeant Bluff, works as a travel coordinator at the airport. She arrived at the event four hours early.
“We need to get rid of what we have in Washington and get back to making this country great again,” she said. “Our economy is horrible. They are in it for themselves.”
Tyler Stoulil, 39, of Cherokee, also arrived four hours early to see Trump.
“What I really like about Trump is he truly stands for the people,” Stoulil said. “He’s against the globalist agenda.”
“The people should have the power,” he added.
Compared to Trump events around Iowa in the last six years this one included relatively few blasts at the media.
Trump did narrate a video with verbal gaffes by President Joe Biden, and the Republican suggested Biden is not cognitively fit for office, a point leading Democrats reject outright.
Kaufmann reinforced the contention about Biden.
“Take the teleprompters, turn them around, and let us read them,” Kaufmann said of Biden. “You’re pathetic.”
Some of the strongest language of the evening came from U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a provocative Georgia Republican, and an opening speaker for Trump.
“Paul Pelosi should have been a gun owner and shot his attacker,” she said. “But Democrats in the media completely ignore horrific crimes against Americans every day.”
Greene was referencing an attack on Paul Pelosi in the San Francisco home he shares with his wife, U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
(Douglas Burns is a fourth-generation Iowa journalist and a member of the Iowa Writers’ Collaborative. Here are links to other writers:)
This summary was not helpful other than to tell us the people at the rally supported Trump.