Iowa’s 4th congressional district AKA Northwest Iowa and then some is a field operations nightmare with barely 118 thousand registered democrats in a district a couple hundred miles across that is darn near half of Iowa. To put that in perspective, there’s damn near as many registered democrats, 116 thousand, in just Polk County AKA Des Moines. And while parts of the district get as far blue as purple, this is the white homeland of neo-nazi congressmen Steve King, though democratic opponent J.D. Sholten is doing his best to retire him. For democratic presidential field operations, this is one of their toughest challenges.
So it was that I wandered to Sioux City in search of some “ground truth” as to just what was happening on the ground in Iowa 4. ’Twas perfect weather for doorknockin’, with no snow and temps into the 50s, and the Amy Klobuchar campaign was taking advantage of it as at least 15 staffers and volunteers feasted on pizza before heading out to knock some turf, A good sign for a campaign getting off to a slow start.
Cross the street and round the corner I checked in with the Bernie campaign where a couple staffers kept the place alive while doorknockers were out in the streets. They’re tightly targeting to voters that have responded to previous contacts and events, suggesting Bernie’s campaign is looking to stay alive and win some delegates in Iowa rather than an outright win. They talked of 4 thousand contacts by noon and 35 thousand next weekend- Respectable numbers, but there are over six hundred thousand registered democrats in Iowa. Nice folks, and thanks for the donation of some Bernie lawn signs which will raise funds for our local democratic party units.
Next up was Pete’s campaign office, nice and neat inside with a couple cars parked out front and a closed sign on the door… At 1pm on a beautiful Saturday not even two months away from the caucuses? Ditto at the Warren campaign office, but not a single car out front. Checked the listed Steyer campaign office around the corner, and no sign of human habitation- not a single sign out front and blackness inside. Would one expect any less from a campaign where “cutting turf” probably means deciding what TV markets to saturate?
Biden’s campaign office was in a bit more upmarket ‘hood in a strip mall, but there were signs of life at least- One staffer present, some moderate clutter, and they wouldn’t let me smuggle any of their nice 3 by 5 lawn signs back to Minnesota in deference to their Iowa needs. Got some more background on the heckler that harassed Joe the other day from an eyewitness- Good to see Joe make an example of that indecent Trumpster. As I suspected, Joe’s choice to confront such harassment is playing well in rural Iowa.
Checked Liz and Pete’s campaign offices again, still MIA… If someone had to close up while they ran an errand, they’d be back by now. So what the heck is going on with half the major candidate’s offices in a county with 17,380 registered democrats being closed? A messy campaign office is a sign of a winning campaign, and looks like Pete and Liz’s campaign offices are too tidy. Both campaigns may simply be overextended- That day Pete’s campaign had eight “flights” of doorknockers heading our of four northwest Iowa locations, But Liz’s campaign only had three flights out of that sole Sioux City office in northwest Iowa. Closing the campaign office to send every last person out door knocking is a desperation move, like pulling your goalie in hockey. So while Pete’s campaign may be just spread too thin which is not always a bad thing in rural areas, Liz’s MIA campaign staff is ground truth to my suspicions that her campaign has stalled. Steyer is clearly running a ghost campaign that only appears in 2D. Joe’s campaign is clearly hitting on at least a couple cylinders. And Amy’s. campaign is “punching above their weight” , exceeding expectations as she’s moving up into the top tier.
Finally, every campaign trying to meet Iowa’s 600,000+ registered democrats at their front doors at a rate of maybe 20 per doorknocker on a good day has my utmost respect!
Sassy Democrat 