Sue Dvorsky
Much attention has been focused on the Iowa Republican Party Caucuses that will start this evening at 7 p.m., but Iowa Democrats will hold caucuses tonight, too.
Iowa Democratic Party chairwoman Sue Dvorsky made a pitch to younger voters this morning during a rally at a West Des Moines Valley high school.
“Know that your gifts, your challenges, your talking points are what we need to hear,” Dvorsky said.
Democrats will hear from President Obama this evening, as video links are being set up so Obama can deliver a live address to caucus attendees.
“Four years ago to the day was the day his presidency was launched, in Iowa,” Dvorsky said this morning. “And it could only have happened in Iowa. He has said that over and over again.”
Dvorsky called the state’s first-in-the-nation caucuses a “civil” process.
“You’re doggone right we’re number one. We should be number one,” Dvorksy said. “We should hold on to number one and the reason we should do that is because it’s only here that a conversation can happen. It’s only here that the candidates don’t just give us their 30-seconds. They hear us.”
Staff from the Democratic National Committee dispatched a staffer to Iowa months ago to run their effort to counter what the Republican candidates have been saying in the state. Their primary target, however, has been Mitt Romney.
“It’s desperately important for him to win here,” Democratic National Committee communications director Brad Woodhouse said during a news conference in Des Moines. “If he can invest the millions of dollars that he has in Iowa all of the time; all of the campaigning; five consecutive years, really, of running for president — I mean he never really stopped after he lost the first time; if he walks out with anything but a first-place win that’s a huge setback.”
The presidential candidate with the most aggressive campaign operation in Iowa over the past year may have been President Obama, with eight offices operating around the state and a turn-out plan for tonight’s Democratic Caucuses to lay the groundwork for the November election. Iowa is likely to be one of those so-called “battleground” or “swing” states in the general election, meaning Obama and whomever Republicans nominate to run against him will be spending time campaigning here as the November election draws near.