More than 200 people braved below-zero temperatures in Sioux City for a Women for Trump bus tour stop. The event started at 10 a.m. on Thursday and, if turnout is any indication, Iowans are still pumped for Trump.
“I’m a little confused guys,” said Lara Trump. “I thought women didn’t support Donald Trump.”
Trump was joined by Kayleigh McEnany, the national campaign press secretary, and Mercedes Schlapp, a senior Trump adviser.
Trump opened the conversation by talking about how she got involved in the 2016 campaign.
“I did not grow up in New York City,” she said. “I was born and raised in North Carolina, in a middle-class family, in a small town — so I can guarantee you I never had the idea that my last name would be Trump, let alone be part of the First Familly.”
Lara went to Wilmington, NC with Donald Trump for a campaign stop in 2016. President Trump told her he wanted her to run his campaign in North Carolina.
“He’s promoted people who started as security guards, doormen, to be the executives,” Lara said. “He sees something in people that they maybe don’t even see in themselves. That’s how I ended up here.”
Hillary Clinton had said North Carolina would be her firewall. The Tar Heel State would be her ticket to the 270 electoral college votes she needed.
“Mind you, I had no idea how anything worked with a Presidential campaign, or how to win a state,” Lara Trump said. “But I worked really, really hard.”
November 8, 2016, which was the night of the election and also Lara’s wedding anniversary, is a night she said she will never forget. The team was watching CNN.
“Only because we knew when CNN called it, that was it,” she said. “They were going to wait until the last possible second to say that Donald Trump won a state.”
When North Carolina was announced for Trump, President Trump told Lara he won the state because of her.
“First of all, he was a much better candidate, let’s be honest,” she said. “He won because he was the right person for the job, but he always gives credit where credit is due. That’s something he’s done his entire life.”
Lara said her father-in-law is not who the media makes him out to be.
“He loves his family, he’s intensely loyal to people who work and fight for him and who love him,” she said. “He’s intensely loyal to the people of this country. I just want you guys to know, you got a fighter in the White House every single day fighting for you. And, he never forgets when people go out and work hard for him.”
Schlapp said working for President Trump has been one of the biggest honors of her life.
“What I got to see, firsthand, was a man who had this great vision for America,” she said.
President Trump stood up to China right away, Schlapp said. He also passed significant tax cuts early in his first term. Through it all, though, there was room for conversation.
“He allowed for debate in the Oval Office,” she said.
Then he would pick up all the information, consolidate it and figure out the path forward.
“That, to me, is spectacular,” she said. “Why? Because he gets the job done. It’s not just blah, blah, blah, talk, talk, talk. He is really fundamentally changing America. You have Democrats in Congress trying to stop him.”
Of the seven million new jobs President Trump has helped create, 60 percent of those went to women. He has set in motion policies that are helping strengthen American families. And he’s helped bring back manufacturing jobs, which are jobs that former President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden said would be gone forever.
“Don’t you feel kind of sad for Joe Biden,” Lara asked. “Guys, it’s so bad when he’s supposed to be the opponent and every time he talks I’m like “Ooh, I hope he doesn’t mess something up.'”
Far more people support Trump than most think, Lara said. That’s because the “fake news” media has succeeded in painting a false picture of who Trump is and, more importantly, who his supporters are.
Schlapp talked about Trump’s healthcare ideas.
“Well, what he’s not going to do is Medicare For All,” she said. “I think it’s really important to understand framing this in the Democrats’ little utopia, socialist world that they live in, their Medicare for all proposal would literally lead to losing about 180 million private health insurance. You’d have government-run health care. And, let me tell you about government-run health care — it sucks. It stinks. It doesn’t work.”
Trump has worked to protect people with pre-existing conditions and he’s also taking on big pharmaceutical companies. Prescription drugs are at their lowest rates since 1970.
And, what do Democrats want to do?
“Impeachment,” she said.
President Trump’s track record of success is why Washington despises him, they said.
“He is beholden to no one. This President works on behalf of you, the American People,” Lara said. “That is why in three years, despite everything he’s had against him, he’s been so incredibly successful. And that is why they are terrified of Donald Trump in Washington, D.C.”
Meanwhile, the Democrats keep moving further Left. Lara suggested Obama wouldn’t survive on the Democrat debate stage in 2020.
“It’s the unfortunate truth,” she said.
Women are coming around to Trump. In 2016, 25 percent of the donations to the campaign were from women. In 2019, and now 2020, half of the campaign’s donations are from women.
“So, you tell me,” Lara said. “Are women supporting President Trump?”
Lara did discuss the idea that the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians in 2016.
“The fact that the Democrats and the media cooked up this hoax that Donald Trump colluded with the Russians — we couldn’t even have colluded with you guys in Iowa,” she said. “None of us had any political experience. We were figuring things out as we went.”
Schlapp ended her remarks by talking about how quickly countries can change.
“Our democracy is fragile,” she said. “Our country can change in an instant. You look at a country like Cuba, you look at countries like Venezuela. My father, who fought for freedom in Cuba, was thrown into jail for six years because he was trying to fight the communists and his freedoms were taken away.
“I would tell my fellow women America is really the most special place. We have freedoms like no other country. I am not going to allow this left-leaning media and these Democrats to shut us up and, for the first time in a really really long time, President Trump stands up, speaks strong, speaks the truth and talks about the importance of protecting our freedoms and he doesn’t shy away. He fights. And, that’s what he’s taught me. In my long history of politics, you fight, you stand strong because the Democrats are going to shut you down. They really do believe that America needs to be changed, that it’s not good enough. And I say no. No way.
“That’s what I love about the President, he stands for our country, he fights for our people, he fights for our freedoms and he fights for our Republic and our Democracy. That’s the legacy that I want our children to remember.”
Lara Trump wrapped up by telling those in attendance it isn’t about Trump or his family or his advisors, it’s about the country.
“This isn’t about a President, this isn’t about an administration,” Trump said. “It’s about a country. It’s about the future of our country and it’s about you guys. Listen, it’d be great if I could be home with both my kids, I’m out here fighting every single day because this is the most important thing I could be doing right now. It is vital to our country that we keep Donald Trump in the White House.”
The alternative, she said, is frightening.
“The reality is a lot of people who can would leave this country, they could get out of here,” she said. “But so many people would be stuck with these policies that would ruin America and we cannot afford to see that happen. We feel great going into 2020. We feel very strong because I don’t think any of these crazies can beat Donald Trump. But we play every second of the game until the very end. so please, join us. We’d love to have you volunteer. We’d love to have you as part of our women’s coalition. Help us as we fight behind what I like to think will be the greatest President in the history of the United States.”
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