President Trump campaigned in Sioux City, Iowa, on Thursday, speaking at a rally in one of the state’s reddest enclaves as he tries to elevate turnout for Representative Ashley Hinson in the tight battle for Iowa’s open Senate seat.
As Iowa reels from economic turmoil driven by the war with Iran, Mr. Trump’s tariffs and market volatility, the president centered his speech on red-meat attacks against Democrats, while occasionally touching on Iowa.
The once-purple state had been reliably red since 2016; Mr. Trump has won it three times since. But Rob Sand, the Democratic nominee for governor, has led his Republican rival in every major nonpartisan poll this year. Representative Ashley Hinson, the Republican Senate nominee, is neck-and-neck in polls against Josh Turek, the Democratic nominee. And only one of the state’s four Republican-held House seats is seen as safe for the party.
Mr. Trump attacked Democrats as communists, accused them of supporting gender-transition surgeries for children and lobbed Islamophobic broadsides against Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic Senate candidate in Michigan, and Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, who is under investigation by Mr. Trump’s Justice Department.
“Ashley Hinson, on the other hand,” Mr. Trump said, “is a mother, a warrior, a patriot, and she will never let far-left maniacs push the radical left insanity on Iowa’s children.”
The rally came just hours after Mr. Trump and Ms. Hinson split on a campaign issue that is dividing the Republican Party less than two weeks before the election.
An attack ad by the Republican candidate for Ohio governor, Vivek Ramaswamy, features the mother of the Democratic candidate, Amy Acton. The ad has drawn bipartisan backlash, in part because Ms. Acton’s mother backed her husband after he was arrested on charges of raping Ms. Acton as a child.
Mr. Trump defended the ad in a social media post earlier on Thursday, urging Mr. Ramaswamy to continue airing it. But hours later, Ms. Hinson called on Mr. Ramaswamy to take it down.
“I think about it as a mom, and you think about childhood, having to relive that trauma,” Hinson told ABC News on Thursday, adding that it is “terrible.” She also called Vice President JD Vance’s support of the ad “ridiculous,” adding later in a post on social media that while she disagrees with him about the ad, she looks forward to “continuing to work with him and President Trump when I’m in the U.S. Senate.”
Mr. Trump again defended the ad Thursday night.
“When I first saw it,” Trump said, “I said, wow, that means Vivek easily will win the race.”
He continued, recounting a conversation with Ramaswamy: “The mother said horrible things about your opponent. Why can’t I have that happen to me? That’s a good thing. But, I said, you’ve got to ride with it.”
It was the latest two-step from Ms. Hinson on Mr. Trump, distancing herself from some of his statements and parts of his agenda, while seeking his support to eke out a win against Mr. Turek, a surprisingly competitive Democratic rival, who has argued that her fealty to the president is hurting her constituents.
Hours before Mr. Trump spoke at the rally on Thursday, Ms. Hinson told the crowd that “I’m not sure that he’s always happy with me when we’re talking, because I ask him for a lot of things for Iowa.”
Mr. Trump also said that Ms. Hinson was always asking him to help Iowa, and to “give a little bit more money to the farmers.”
He continued, “I said, this woman is such a pain. But ultimately, that’s nice, I guess.”
Lawmakers in tough re-election races skipped the rally entirely. Representatives Zach Nunn and Mariannette Miller-Meeks, among the most vulnerable incumbents in the House, have also broken with Trump in votes on the Iran War.
Mr. Trump again sought to assure voters that the economic pain brought by high oil prices would soon pass. He insisted, as he has for months, that “but one way or the other, it’s going to be done very soon. And your gasoline prices and your oil is going to come tumbling down.”
He also promoted his executive order eliminating restrictions on tax-free, red-dyed diesel and his $8 billion bailout for farmers hurt by high diesel prices. And he reiterated his promise to send each of them $5,000 checks if Republicans retain the House and Senate majorities, drawing cheers. Mr. Trump has repeatedly not followed through on promises of cash payments since returning to office.
Iowa’s economy, which relies heavily on agriculture and trade, has been strained by high diesel prices and tariffs. Republican candidates in the state have seen their margins continually tighten in competitive races as a result of Mr. Trump’s unpopularity.
Asked about Trump’s handling of the economy, his supporters uniformly praised him, saying that President Trump had done the right thing by striking Iran and that short-term pain from tariffs was worth the long-term gain.
“Sometimes you’ve got to have a little hurt to see progress,” said Steve Glackman, 52, a grain elevator manager from Royal, Iowa.
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