2015-01-25T04:00:00Z 2015-01-25T04:13:17Z Walker, new faces delight GOP crowd Waterloo Cedar Falls Courier
DES MOINES | Some familiar faces restated their resumes, while some new faces introduced themselves and charged the crowd.
The race for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination is on.
Roughly a dozen Republican potential presidential candidates flocked to Des Moines to speak at the Freedom Summit hosted Saturday by Iowa Rep. Steve King and Citizens United.
About 1,000 people filed into the Hoyt Sherman Place theater, and most stayed for the 9½ hours of speeches.
The winners of the last two Iowa GOP caucuses, Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee, spoke. Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who also ran in 2012, was there, along with former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the party’s vice presidential candidate in 2008.
Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey may have had the most to gain — or lose — by appearing at the forum. Considered a moderate in some GOP circles and a party establishment choice in others, he tried to connect with grass-roots conservative activists.
But some of the heartiest crowd responses came for new potential candidates like Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin and Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas.
Darwin Edwards, an Iowa native who now lives in Fayetteville, Ga., and came back for Saturday’s event adorned in an American flag collared shirt, said he was struck most by Walker and Cruz.
“(Walker and Cruz were) two that I had heard about, but today made the hair stand up on my arms, both of them,” Edwards said. “I really think they did a fantastic job.”
Craig Robinson, who publishes a conservative blog in Iowa and is a former state party leader, declared Walker the event’s “winner,” in no small part because he feels the Wisconsin governor made an excellent first impression.
“No. 1, in terms of candidates, he’s a new face. So while he’s been to this state before and he’s spoken at events before, we’re looking at him in a much different light now,” Robinson said. “He is someone who I think is on everyone’s short list, in terms of activists looking at candidates. I think he makes everyone’s list (of candidates) that they’re interested in.”
Walker, using a hand-held microphone as he paced the stage wearing no suit jacket and rolled-up sleeves, told stories of the 2011 protests in Wisconsin over his measure to strip public unions of most of their collective bargaining rights. Walker told the crowd some protesters made death threats to him and members of his family.
When he got to policy, Walker became more fiery, and the crowd responded favorably.
“I think it was important for him to deliver a speech that met those expectations, and I thought he far exceeded them,” Robinson said of Walker. “I thought he showed a lot of passion, fire, good content.”
Perhaps the biggest losers were two of the biggest names in the potential presidential race, neither of whom attended Saturday’s event: Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush.
King said at the program’s outset and conclusion he believes the next president was in attendance Saturday, making clear his feelings about the prospects of Romney and Bush.
Donald Trump gave the most pointed criticism of the duo, saying neither should be the party’s nominee in 2016 and guaranteeing either would lose to the Democratic nominee. Trump said Romney “choked” in the final months of the 2012 election, and he criticized Bush for his moderate views on immigration and education.
Those in attendance seemed to agree. Trump’s and King’s comments both received loud applause.
The event also drew protests that disrupted the speeches of Perry and Christie.
The Dream Action Coalition, an immigration advocacy group, took credit for the protests.
During Perry’s speech, protesters in the theater’s balcony stood up, held signs that said “Deportable?” and yelled to Perry asking if he, as president, would deport their families.
The protesters were escorted out of the building by police, as was a single protester who interrupted Christie’s speech.
King is well-known for his provocative comments on immigration. A staunch opponent of allowing immigrants to stay in the country illegally, King in a recent tweet called them “deportables” and previously said half of undocumented residents are drug smugglers “with calves the size of cantaloupes.”
Immigration advocacy groups protested outside the event throughout Saturday.
On Saturday, King fumbled over a line in his opening address, saying “planet” when he meant “continent.” In his recovery, he said “Those people across the street (protesting), they came from another planet.”
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