Three-time presidential candidate Ron Paul is courting Iowa Republicans who backed former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee in the 2008 Iowa Caucuses. Huckabee announced earlier this month that he would not run again in 2012.
“I think that opens up the door for us because he is one that stood for family values and it’s something that we’ve been pushing real hard,” Paul said Monday during a news conference in Ankeny. “And I think there’s a chance that we will be able to capture a lot of those votes.”
Paul has said the legality of marriage should be left up to the states, but he has called on the Obama Administration to defend the federal “Defense of Marriage Act” because it stipulates that states do not have to legally recognize same-sex marriages sanctioned in another state. Paul, who is a Texas congressman, met Monday with many of the 120 volunteers who’ve signed up to help his campaign get organized for the Iowa Republican Party’s Straw Poll in August.
“I am really encouraged when I see people like you coming out and willing to work and knowing what the odds are, but you also know what the stakes are,” Paul said. “And believe me, I’ve been doing this for a few years and comparing not only to 20 or 30 years ago, but comparing it to four years ago, believe me — things have changed. People are very enthusiastic.”
Paul ran for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination in 2004. In 1988, he was the Libertarian Party’s nominee.
On Monday Paul won the endorsement of a state legislator who’s been pushing to impeach the four justices who joined the 2009 ruling which paved the way for gay marriage in Iowa. Glen Massie of Des Moines was first elected to the Iowa House in 2010 and, in 2011, he joined with four other Republicans in the House to introduce articles of impeachment against the four supreme court justices.