While Iowa caucus voters cast their votes for the Republican presidential candidates Tuesday night, President Barack Obama made his presence known in the same state that launched his successful presidential campaign four years ago.
Mr. Obama chatted with supporters, volunteers, Democrats and overall curious Iowa voters Tuesday through videoconferencing.
On Tuesday, the Obama campaign ran an ad in The Des Moines Register, Iowa’s most popular daily newspaper, displaying remarks from his victory speech after winning the Democratic Iowa caucus four years ago.
Tuesday night, he reiterated some of those remarks to Iowa Democrats, and also told them to prepare for a long and difficult re-election process against the eventual Republican nominee.
“We’ve still got a lot of work to do. But think about the change that was accomplished because of those caucuses four years ago. Because of those caucuses four years ago, we ended the war in Iraq, as promised, and our troops are now coming home,” said the president. “Change is never easy. The problems that we’ve been dealing with over the last three years, they didn’t happen overnight and we’re not going to fix them overnight. But we’ve been making steady progress as long as we can sustain it. And that’s what this is going to be all about.”
After his introduction speech, Mr. Obama answered questions directly from supporters at locations in Cedar Rapids and Coralville, Iowa.
In response to one audience members question regarding the Affordable Care Act and how he responds to people that say he “hasn’t done enough,” the president admitted that there was still a lot that he wanted to accomplish as president.
“I think the main message that we’re going to have in 2012 is that we’ve done a lot but we’ve got a lot more to do, and that’s why we need another four years to get it all done,” said Mr. Obama.
The president is on the Democratic caucus ballot in Iowa, but he is of course unopposed. However, his decision to engage his supporters in Iowa served its purpose of giving the president a presence early in the presidential race that is currently dominated by the competition between the Republican presidential candidates.
According to a recent Gallup poll, the president’s job approval rating is currently 45 percent, and he holds a slight lead in recent Gallup polls that place him in hypothetical match-ups against each of the Republican presidential candidates.
In recent weeks the Obama campaign team has consistently attacked Mitt Romney, indicating their belief that the former Massachusetts governor will eventually win the Republican nomination.
Mr. Obama opened up eight field offices in Iowa to engage supporters that may feel left out amid all of the conservative rhetoric currently being exchanged between the Republican candidate camps, and Tuesday night his video conference with supporters in Iowa, signals his commitment to waging a fierce campaign against whoever does eventually win the Republican nomination for 2012.
