Iowa Republican Senate candidate Joni Ernst is coming under fire from the state's largest newspaper for canceling her endorsement interview with its editorial board, but her camp says she stayed away because of the publication's criticism of her and her campaign.
Ernst was to have met with editors from The Des Moines register on Thursday, reports
The Washington Post, but she cancelled at the last minute because she believed the paper's editorial board showed a bias against her during the last two months.
The paper's editors have slammed Ernst for
her comments on poverty; her support for a "
personhood amendment; " and her opinion on
"nullification," or whether states can choose not to obey certain federal laws.
"We already knew where the editorial board was — all negative on Joni," said the official, speaking anonymously to The Post. "Why would we go in there? We knew how this was going to play out."
Meanwhile, her spokesperson, Gretchen Hamel, confirmed the unnamed official's comments.
"Recent editorials in the Des Moines Register make their position in this race perfectly clear, and it's one that many voters across our state seem to disagree with," said Hamel in a statement.
"With less than 12 days to go, time is precious and Joni wants to spend every minute talking to undecided voters, hearing their concerns, and demonstrating why we need a change in Washington."
Ernst's Democratic opponent, Rep. Bruce Braley, has already met with the board, which is expected to announce its endorsements on Sunday, The Post reported.
Register Publisher Rick Green said in a statement the paper was "disappointed" by the Ernst camp's decision to skip the meeting and "share her vision for our state and the rest of the country."
Green called the Ernst-Braley contest "an incredibly nasty, competitive race where both sides have spent millions and aired tens of thousands of TV spots."
Undecided voters want Ernst to "break through the rhetoric and cacophony of campaign ads about hogs, Obamacare and balanced budgets," and start sharing specifics, said Green.
But he said he's not "angry" that she "snubbed The Des Moines Register editorial board, which is in final deliberations about our Senate endorsement," as the paper wanted to allow Ernst to share her insights.
But Ernst's decision to skip the meeting with The Register won't determine its endorsement, said Green, as "this is too important of a race to let petty things like that affect our endorsement process. But we are disappointed she didn’t come in today.”
The Register has endorsed both Republicans and Democrats in the past, including picking Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney over President Barack Obama in 2012, while picking Obama in 2008.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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