Iowa has become tricky territory for GOP in midterm election homestretch

Iowa Republicans are being presented with the difficult choice of embracing President Trump in the final stretch of the midterms as Democrats seek to tie them to the administration.

The dynamic was on full display in Council Bluffs on Friday, when Iowa gubernatorial candidate Zach Lahn joined Vice President Vance on the campaign trail, but Republican Senate candidate Rep. Ashley Hinson opted to skip the event.

Hawkeye State Republicans are acutely aware of the risks of siding with the administration on issues like the Iran war.

Iowa Reps. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R) and Zach Nunn (R) were among a group of seven House Republicans who voted with Democrats this week to block Trump from continuing the Iran war without approval from Congress.

All eyes were on the state’s Republican gubernatorial and Senate campaigns Friday with the vice president in town.

Hinson’s campaign cited scheduling conflicts ahead of the rally, but Vance still gave her a shoutout at the beginning of the event.

“I know she couldn’t be here today, but are we going to elect Ashley Hinson for United States Senator from the great state of Iowa?” Vance said, eliciting applause from the crowd.

Vance went on to tout Lahn’s candidacy before launching into a roughly seven-minute attack on Democratic gubernatorial nominee Rob Sand.

“The choice is this simple. It’s common sense versus crazy. It’s a man who listens to you versus a man who looks down on you. It’s a governor who fights for you versus a governor who fights against you,” Vance said.

“You have an opportunity to send not just Rob Sand but the entire Democrat Party a message: Check the crazy at the door, and learn to fight for Americans for a change,” he continued.

Polls show both races tightening, with Democrats holding a slight edge.

A poll released earlier this month from Emerson College Polling/Nexstar Media shows Sand leading Lahn 49 percent to 46 percent. The same poll found Democratic Senate nominee Josh Turek leading Hinson 46 percent to 44 percent.

The nonpartisan Cook Political Report rates the Senate race as a “toss up” and the gubernatorial race as “lean Democratic.”

Hinson has shown other signs she is carefully navigating how to approach Trump and the administration in her race. Hinson attended last week’s GOP midterm convention in Dallas, but unlike other high-profile Republicans in attendance, she did not speak on stage.

“Zach Lahn and Ashley Hinson are two very different candidates, and they’re also facing two very different opponents,” said one Republican operative familiar with Iowa.

Lahn had strong support from the “Make American Healthy Again” (MAHA) movement in the Republican primary, scoring a major primary victory against Trump-backed candidate Rep. Randy Feenstra (R-Iowa).

Sand holds a fundraising and cash-on-hand advantage over Lahn. Many Republicans, including Vance, have hit Sand over receiving high-dollar contributions from family members.

Sand’s campaign fired back at Vance and Lahn in a statement, accusing the vice president of bailing the Republican nominee out.

“He’s bringing in another D.C. insider to try to bail him out because he can’t answer for his frequent flights to Kansas or his decade-long career as a political operative,” said Maddie Moher, Sand’s campaign press secretary.

“The attacks Lahn has pushed have been repeatedly found false by independent fact-checkers and news outlets, and outsourcing his talking points to another Washington politician doesn’t make them true. Iowa voters know the leader who will actually show up and work for them is Rob Sand,” she continued.

Miller-Meeks and Nunn were not in attendance at Friday’s rally, which did not take place in either of their congressional districts.

However, the pair made headlines along with five other Republicans for voting with Democrats on a war powers resolution earlier this week that would have curbed Trump’s power in continuing the war in Iran.

“It’s definitely notable,” said one national Republican operative, who added that other House Republicans facing uphill reelection bids voted with Democrats on the matter.

However, the operative pushed back on the notion that it is a sign vulnerable Republicans are running away from the administration.

Last month, Michigan Rep. Tom Barrett (R) voted in favor of a war powers resolution that would have limited Trump’s authority to continue the Iran war but appeared on stage with him at a rally in Michigan days later.

“I wouldn’t read into the war powers resolution as a way of ‘oh my god, our candidates are distancing themselves from Trump’ or anything. It’s more about this issue specifically,” the national Republican operative said, noting that Barrett, Miller-Meeks and Nunn are military veterans.

Nunn has also shown he is willing to appear with administration officials in his district, including Vance and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

“The reason you send Vance to Iowa or any administration official to any battleground is you want to fire up the base, and you want to turn out the base voters,” said the GOP operative familiar with Iowa.