Haley, DeSantis describe faith-inspired moments during event with Iowa evangelical voters

DES MOINES — Nikki Haley shared how her faith sustained her after the 2015 shooting deaths of nine Black Americans by a white supremacist shooter.

Ron DeSantis said his faith enabled him to weather the “slings and arrows” that he said came his way after backlash to policies he enacted as Florida’s governor.

And Tim Scott confirmed that he is dating someone — “a lovely Christian girl,” he said — adding that he is thankful that God has guided him in a way that has allowed his life “to intersect at the right time with the right person.”

Faith was a prominent topic — as were anti-abortion policies and the protection of religion freedom — on Saturday night in downtown Des Moines during a fundraising event that featured 10 of the Republican candidates for president and was hosted by the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition, the state chapter of a national Christian conservative organization.

Roughly 1,200 people attended Saturday night’s fundraiser, according to event organizers, giving those candidates yet another opportunity to address a large swath of evangelical voters — one of the strongest voting blocs within the Republican Party in Iowa.

The lone prominent candidate missing from Saturday night’s event was former President Donald Trump, who also happens to be the front-runner at this stage of the Republican presidential primary.

Each of the candidates was interviewed by either Ralph Reed, founder and chairman of the national Faith & Freedom Coalition, or Republican Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird.

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One recurring question for the candidates was how faith has informed their public service. Haley, for example, was asked how her faith sustained her through the aftermath of the shooting at Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in 2015, when she was South Carolina’s governor. During that time, the Confederate flag was removed from the South Carolina statehouse grounds and placed in a museum.

Haley said her focus as governor was to prevent the state from becoming divided over the Confederate flag, and to prevent public riots. She also talked about attending the funerals of the shooting victims, and how she was eventually diagnosed with PTSD.

“I was deeply affected by it,” Haley said. “I remember one day getting on my knees and saying, ‘God, I can’t do this by myself. I need you.’ And the strength and grace that he showed me, I will tell you, was a defining moment in my life. Because it was the only way that I was able to pull through and get through it.”

DeSantis said his faith has enabled him “to weather the storms that come” when enacting policies that lead to some backlash. He singled out Florida’s moves to reopen businesses earlier than other states during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, LGBTQ-related public school policies, and his legal tussles with Disney.

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“People sometimes ask me what does it take to be an effective leader, and to me, I would say first put on the full armor of God. Then you can be an effective leader when you do that,” DeSantis said, adding that he believes the power of prayer helped lift his wife Casey’s spirits during her bout with breast cancer.

Iowa Republicans still weighing their options

Trump has been the consistent and dominant leader in polling on the Republican presidential primary this year, both nationally and in Iowa. Trump leads the rest of the field by 44 percentage points in Real Clear Politics’ rolling average of national polls, and while that lead is smaller in Iowa, he led Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis by 23 points in an August Des Moines Register/NBC News/Mediacom Iowa Poll, and by 37 points in a September Iowa State/Civiqs poll.

However, conversations with Iowans who attended Saturday’s event served as a reminder that while the polling has been consistent, many Iowa Republicans’ minds remain unsettled four months out from the Jan. 15, first-in-the-nation Iowa Republican caucuses.

Phil and Pat Hetrick, a husband and wife from Atlantic in western Iowa, both said they are primarily considering three candidates: Donald Trump, Vivek Ramaswamy and Tim Scott.

Both Hetricks expressed frustration with but also concern about the legal issues facing Trump.

National Democrats deployed a mobile billboard in Des Moines that labeled the Republican presidential candidates as all having “extreme MAGA agendas,” referring to Trump’s campaign slogan. The billboard highlighted issues like abortion, Social Security and Medicare, and tax policy for wealthy Americans and businesses.

Iowa Democratic Party Chairwoman Rita Hart took a similar messaging approach in a statement the party issued ahead of Saturday night’s event; she also used the MAGA label and highlighted abortion policy.

“The MAGA Republicans gathering in Des Moines (Saturday) have signed or voiced support for some of the most cruel, anti-choice legislation our country has ever seen,” Hart said in the statement. “It’s abundantly clear that if they got the chance, many of them would sign the most restrictive abortion bans they could and strip away the rights of millions of women across this country. They are all wildly out of step with Iowa women who overwhelmingly want and deserve the right to make decisions about their own bodies.”

Comments: (515) 355-1300, erin.murphy@thegazette.com