WALL STREET JOURNAL: Meet the Democrat Who Republicans Fear in Red-State America

WALL STREET JOURNAL: “Meet the Democrat Who Republicans Fear in Red-State America”

DES MOINES, IA – Wall Street Journal reporter John McCormick tagged along with candidate for governor Rob Sand during one of his many visits to the Iowa State Fair last week as he continued to meet with voters from across the state. As McCormick reports, Rob’s strengths as a candidate and his unique approach is making the insiders in Des Moines who have benefited from decades of one-party rule scared.

McCormick writes Rob “frequently quotes the Bible, owns two SIG Sauer handguns, goes deer hunting each fall and asks audiences to sing a few verses of ‘America the Beautiful’ at the start of campaign events…His campaign’s dominant color for signs and T-shirts is green, not blue. Those items often include phrases such as ‘governor for all.’”

Rob’s cross-party appeal has gotten attention from the other side, including from conservative leader Bob Vander Plaats, who called Rob a “‘very real opponent’ to be taken seriously.” Throughout the fair voters stopped Rob to express their support for his campaign, with one former Democrat-turned Republican saying “I want you as our next governor,” and another fairgoer noting how Rob “tries to meet people in the middle.”

Read more from the Wall Street Journal here, or key quotes below:

Rob Sand could almost pass for a Republican: He frequently quotes the Bible, owns two SIG Sauer handguns, goes deer hunting each fall and asks audiences to sing a few verses of “America the Beautiful” at the start of campaign events.
The only Democrat elected to statewide office in Iowa, Sand is trying to jump to the governor’s mansion from his current state auditor post. In the process, he is offering a potential template for others in his party on how to compete in red-state America.
Voters are tired of partisan division, Sand said during an interview at the Iowa State Fair. “In a two-choice system, if you can convince people that the other side is out to destroy your way of life, or evil, then you don’t have to do the hard work of listening to people and crafting solutions and solving problems,” he said. “You can get re-elected anyway.”
On numerous occasions, Sand mentioned his Lutheran faith. “Jesus is for the little guy. Jesus is for the outcast. And the Democratic Party is for the little guy,” he said.
His campaign’s dominant color for signs and T-shirts is green, not blue. Those items often include phrases such as “governor for all.”
The nonpartisan Cook Political Report moved the contest from “solid Republican” to “lean Republican” when Sand entered the race, a rare two-category move. It called the Democratic front-runner “easily the strongest contender his party could have recruited.”
Sand does 100 town halls each year for his current job. He has started to ask people at his campaign events to raise their hands to indicate their political affiliation, before asking them to sing a few bars of “America the Beautiful” with him. He picked the song, he said, because “everybody knows the words,” and it doesn’t have too many high or low notes. “The point of it is unity,” he said.
“I want you as our next governor,” Kent Berryman told him. The 67-year-old retired farmer from southeast Iowa later said he is a former Democrat who left the party and voted for Trump in 2016 because he felt his previous party “overplayed equity and inclusion.”
Barb Meister, a 66-year-old Republican from northwest Iowa, said she would vote for Sand because “he tries to meet people in the middle.”
Sand said most voters want more cooperation in politics. “Our founders would be embarrassed by the fact that we don’t talk to each other,” he said.
Near the end of his fair visit, Sand stopped at a local radio station’s temporary studio to talk with a conservative host. “Blessed are the peacemakers,” he said when asked why he made that stop.

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