DES MOINES
Representatives from the fundraising group Americans for Rick Perry showed up at a small rally featuring Republican presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty here in Des Moines this morning. Asked about reports that Perry will use a speech in South Carolina Saturday to “make clear” that he is running for president — Saturday just happens to be the day of the long-awaited GOP straw poll in Ames, Iowa — the representatives claimed that Perry is in no way trying to upstage events in Iowa.
“Governor Perry is not trying to rain on the Iowa straw poll,” said Nate Crain, who is national finance chairman of Americans for Rick Perry. “He’s simply just trying to get the message out because everybody keeps asking about it. So I think he just finally needs to send a signal that he’s going to have the intention to run. He didn’t announce, and he’s not going to officially announce, because he doesn’t want to hurt the Iowa straw poll.”
Crain, a Dallas businessman who has known Perry for years, stressed that Americans for Rick Perry is an independent expenditure group and is not connected to the Perry camp. “I have talked to nobody connected with the governor’s campaign,” he said. Crain says he last spoke to Perry about nine months ago.
Perry’s planned speech in South Carolina is not being well received by some Republicans here in Iowa — not because of its substance but because of its timing. “Texas Governor Rick Perry’s decision to announce his candidacy in South Carolina at the same time the Iowa Straw Poll is taking place in Ames is not only a slap in the face to Republican voters in Iowa, but it also is disrespectful to the Iowa GOP and the other candidates seeking the nomination,” former state party official Craig Robinson wrote on The Iowa Republican website. “The move makes it obvious that Governor Perry either doesn’t understand the Iowa caucuses or doesn’t respect the role that Iowa plays in the nominating process.”
Asked if it is just a coincidence that Perry’s big speech will come on the same day as the straw poll, Crain said Perry had to make a move this weekend because of the mounting expectations that he will enter the race. “He needs to finally get the message out, because everybody is speculating, speculating, speculating,” Crain said. “He’s not trying to mess with the straw poll, because if he was trying to mess with the straw poll, he would just come out and say, ‘I’m running for president.'”
So Perry is speaking on Saturday, the same day as the biggest event in the GOP race in Iowa so far, simply because time’s a-wasting? “Yes,” Crain said. “Everybody has the highest respect for the straw poll. We wouldn’t be here if we didn’t have the highest respect for the straw poll.”
