Following up on this post, I’ve been looking through the list of 1,040 county co-chairs for Governor Terry Branstad’s re-election campaign. Many former state lawmakers and most of the current Republicans in the Iowa legislature signed on in their home counties. I would expect all the sitting GOP legislators to cooperate with the Branstad campaign, because down-ticket candidates stand to benefit from a strong showing for the governor next November. However, four of the 24 Iowa Senate Republicans and fourteen of the 53 Iowa House Republicans have not signed on.
Follow me after the jump for details on which legislators signed on as Branstad-Reynolds volunteers and which are conspicuously absent. I have a few theories about why some people ended up in each group, but some choices surprised me.
UPDATE: Some of the absent names may simply have been unable to respond to the governor’s campaign in time to be included in today’s release. For example, Iowa House Majority Whip Chris Hagenow contacted me to clarify that he is co-chairing the Branstad-Reynolds campaign. I will continue to update this post as needed.
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