Ernst to Iowa conservatives: ‘Don't give up’

URBANDALE - Sen. Joni Ernst urged Iowa conservatives Wednesday to 'don't give up,” noting GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump continues to do well in Iowa and reminding them she was locked in a tight 2014 election battle with Democrat Bruce Braley before beating him by 8 points.

While some public opinion polls are showing Democrat Hillary Clinton leading Trump nationally or locked in tight contests in key battleground states, Ernst, R-Red Oak, told the Westside Conservative Club he is 'doing very well” and 'staying strong” in Iowa - a swing state with six electoral votes.

The first-term senator said the polls had her 'about even this time of year” in her 2014 U.S. Senate race with Braley before she won decisively.

'People didn't see that coming,” she said. 'You know what, maybe the pollsters out there don't see Donald Trump coming, so don't give up, don't give up, don't give up.”

Ernst said the two words voters should have foremost in their minds when they cast ballots on Nov. 8 are 'Supreme Court.” She said the next president could name up to three justices - a process that is likely to reshape the court and carry long-term implications.

'I think that shift will last much more than a generation. They will be legislating from the Supreme Court ideas that we don't believe in, so 2016 is so important,” Ernst said.

Both at the Wednesday morning conservative breakfast and at a Polk County GOP fundraiser Tuesday evening, Ernst criticized what she sees as a 'lack of leadership” by the Obama administration, including the years that Clinton had a hand in directing foreign policy as U.S. secretary of state.

She pointed to 'Hillary's failed policies all around the globe” in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Libya and Iran, saying, 'We can't forget these things, folks. We can't forget them nor should we forgive them because she knowingly went into those policies and pushed them within the administration. We should not allow her to take the White House.”

Officials with Hillary for America issued a statement indicating Trump is temperamentally unfit to serve as president and the nation's commander in chief.

'Donald Trump seeks our nation's highest office, but he so utterly lacks the temperament required of the United States' commander-in-chief, it would be laughable if it weren't so frightening,” the statement reads. 'As Hillary Clinton reminded us in June, some of the comments he has made about world affairs are so ignorant, incoherent, and/or outrageous, it is hard to believe they actually came out of the mouth of a presidential nominee. As Hillary Clinton has said, Donald Trump is a loose cannon, and loose cannons tend to misfire.”

Ernst also said Obamacare has been exposed as 'an utter disaster” that means health insurance rate increases of 25 percent or more for some Iowans, but she doubted Congress would be able to do much to fix the problems yet this year, and Republicans could see their 54-majority in the U.S. Senate shrink to 51 or 52 after next month's election.

'It's going to be very difficult to change that law,” she said, even with Trump as president, unless there is some bipartisan agreement going forward.

While some Republicans have broken with Trump over positions he has taken or the release of a video in which he is heard making lewd comments about women, Ernst said she is supporting Republicans 'all up and down the ticket, all the way to the top, folks.

'I have not backed off on that and I will not back off on that because of the importance of 2016 and the implications that go beyond 2020 and 2024. I've had people say ‘I can take four years of Hillary Clinton, I can take eight years of Hillary Clinton, I've done it with Barack Obama.'

'No, folks, we can't,” she said.