--:-- Sean Rameswaram: I love a good atlas, and I've never made one, but with the KiwiCo crate, you can make your own atlas. So provide for your children that which I was robbed of at KiwiCo.com slash explained. Again, that is K-I-W-I-C-O dot com slash explained. It's fun for all ages, and the kids can try it for free.
--:-- Tara Golshan: Tara Golshin, you spent the weekend at the Iowa State Fair for Vox. Why? Well, it's 2019, and it's about six months before the Iowa caucuses, which is the first time voters will be able to cast their vote in the 2020 presidential election. and almost all of the Democratic 2020 candidates were at the Iowa State Fair this weekend.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Tell me about the fair. I've never been. It sounds kind of amazing.
--:-- Tara Golshan: There are a lot of foods on sticks. There are pork chops on sticks and fried cheese and fried chicken and... There are some fried pickles. We'll give you all the fried veggies. Fried Oreos. Dreamy. Anything basically that's going to give you a heart attack is at this fair.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Aren't two of the candidates like vegans though? What are they eating?
--:-- Tara Golshan: One of the candidates is vegan, Cory Booker. So Cory Booker ate some PB&J sandwiches on a stick.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: I'm going to get one more PB&J. The PB&Js on a stick? It's the sandwich? It's still on a stick. It's in the prayer right now.
--:-- Tara Golshan: All right. This is amazing, guys. Tell us what it tastes like.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: I think the best way to describe this is a little slice of heaven.
--:-- Tara Golshan: I've heard previous years have had a yodeling contest, a hog calling contest, a wives calling their husbands contest.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Can you hear me? You get yourself in here right now.
--:-- Tara Golshan: Does like all of Iowa show up? How many people come out?
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: So a lot of people show up and not even just from Iowa, from around the country. And in 2017, there were more than a million people that came.
--:-- Tara Golshan: And especially going into an election year, it's a big draw to see the candidates because there's also an actual soapbox where each- There's an actual soapbox for the candidates to get up on.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Yeah, there is this kind of bale of hay that is sponsored by the Des Moines Register, the local paper here. and each of the potential presidential candidates can get 20 minutes to get up there and rally a crowd and tell everyone what they're about.
--:-- Tara Golshan: Hello, Iowa State Fair! My name is Elizabeth Warren, and I'm running for president because I am sick of a country that works better and better for a thinner and thinner slice at the top.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: The fair started, I think, last Thursday, was a big thing this weekend and carries through to the end next weekend. But most of the candidates showed up this past weekend.
--:-- Tara Golshan: Who were Iowans most excited to see? Some of the biggest crowds were for people that you would expect, like Vice President Joe Biden and Senator Elizabeth Warren and Senator Kamala Harris and Senator Bernie Sanders. Cory Booker also got a really big crowd.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Notably, Slipknot was performing the night of Cory Booker's speech, and they were doing a sound check during his rally.
--:-- Tara Golshan: We need to get back to what the Constitution says. Ouch. Which is even more harsh if you know what Slipknot sounds like.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Yeah, I actually don't know what Slipknot sounds like. I can help with that. You want to know? I don't know if I want to know.
--:-- Tara Golshan: Oh, it's my duty as a former teenager to demonstrate for you what Slipknot sounds like. Give me one second.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Poor Corey. Oh, fun fact. The lead singer of Slipknot's name, Corey. Whoa. Also interesting fun fact about Slipknot, which I learned this week, is that they're from Des Moines. They're from Iowa. Hometown heroes.
--:-- Tara Golshan: Yeah. Yeah. They're coming home. Des Moines, fucking Iowa! So Slipknot did well.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: How about all the candidates? How did they do?
--:-- Tara Golshan: I think what was most notable to me is that Iowa voters are known for kind of hearing everyone out there. I mean, there was a crowd for Marianne Williamson. There was a crowd for John Delaney. These candidates that haven't really been registering much attraction in the polls.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: But the big names are still the big names here. And you ask Iowa voters, they're still naming people like Biden and Warren. and Sanders and Harris and Buttigieg.
--:-- Tara Golshan: And those are the people that really captured the attention of state fairgoers.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Did any of them say anything beyond the sort of boilerplate?
--:-- Tara Golshan: I think the most notable thing of voters that are Democratic or leading Democratic is that their number one priority always to me was that they want to get Trump out of office Iowa is a state that voted for Trump in 2016. He beat Hillary Clinton by almost 10 points.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And currently the polling shows us that he's about 11 points underwater in the state.
--:-- Tara Golshan: Hmm. And are there still Republicans hanging out there interacting with these Democratic candidates or is it sort of just a partisan crowd?
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: So every soapbox speech begins with a disclaimer. What are we? Iowa nice. That means no heckling. Be kind to your fellow humans.
--:-- Tara Golshan: No signs held up because then people can't see. And that's not very nice, is it? That you can cheer, but don't jeer.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Of course, that was sometimes broken. There were times where there were Trump supporters in the crowds that they were wearing Make America Great. Again, hats and flags.
--:-- Tara Golshan: I was walking with Senator Bernie Sanders as they take a tour around the fair usually. And he ate a corn dog and walked around the amusement park.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Guys, be careful that you don't fall on your head. Your health insurance probably doesn't cover that.
--:-- Tara Golshan: But as he was walking around, there were Trump supporters that were booing him.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: So you see that kind of activity as well.
--:-- Tara Golshan: But overwhelmingly, a lot of people were here just to listen to the candidates and see what they had to say.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And I even talked to some Trump supporters that have no intention of ever voting for a Democrat that did want to hear what the Democrats had to say.
--:-- Tara Golshan: And they were just standing there quietly.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Did that whole Iowa nice thing apply to the candidates themselves?
--:-- Tara Golshan: Of course, when we see all of them together, it's usually on a debate stage and they're taking shots at each other.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Yeah, I think something that has really been showing through is how much the candidates want to show that they're friends with each other.
--:-- Tara Golshan: There's all these moments where they run into each other constantly at the fair. And there was a moment between Kamala Harris and Representative Tim Ryan where he passed his kid on to Kamala Harris.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: and they were just chatting at the state fair.
--:-- Tara Golshan: There was another very funny moment where Senator Kirsten Gillibrand's son was deciding who to vote for in this unofficial, unscientific poll.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Here, I'll let you do my vote.
--:-- Tara Golshan: And he was joking, oh, maybe I should vote for Senator Warren.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And of course, Kirsten Gillibrand put her kids straight and made him vote for her.
--:-- Tara Golshan: She's good. Come on. She's pretty good. I'll vote for her.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Did anyone like move the needle in any way? Did anyone have a big moment that may actually change their standing in the polls?
--:-- Tara Golshan: I don't know if we can tell at this point whether or not the Iowa State Fair made it for anyone.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: I'm sure it is always a big thing, especially for some of the lesser known candidates to get out in front of people.
--:-- Tara Golshan: But also notably, I didn't see anything that really kind of broke it for anyone.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: The Iowa State Fair is kind of like a high risk, high reward kind of a thing. Like you're in front of all these people. If you have a misstep, it could go really badly for you because you're like on a big stage here.
--:-- Tara Golshan: Did anyone have a misstep?
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: There was a moment on stage where Joe Biden tripped over his words.
--:-- Tara Golshan: We choose unity over division. We choose science over fiction. We choose truth over facts.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: But even that was kind of a blip on the event. He was very well attended and people were following him around.
--:-- Tara Golshan: Obviously, he's a former vice president to an extremely popular president. And people want to take their pictures and see Joe Biden eat ice cream.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Is there any sense at the end of the weekend how people felt about the candidates, formal or informal polling or anything like that?
--:-- Tara Golshan: There is an informal poll. And I do want to stress that this is extremely unscientific. But basically what happens is that right outside of this soapbox area, there is a corn kernel poll, which is essentially every fair goer, Candace, gets a kernel and you get to pick which candidate you like the best.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And put it in the jar of the candidate that you are most likely to vote for at the time.
--:-- Tara Golshan: And it's all the candidates, Republican and Democrat. And what we saw was that it did kind of reflect general state polling.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: So Biden, Warren, Buttigieg, Harris and Sanders were the ones registering on that poll.
--:-- Tara Golshan: And of course, on the Republican side, Trump was overwhelmingly winning over his challenger, Bill Weld.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Does like the Electoral College come in at the end of the week and just like tip them all over and say we're going to do whatever we want to do anyway?
--:-- Tara Golshan: I do not think so. A good joke.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: After the break whether you have to eat all those deep Oreos and PB and corn dogs to win the election
--:-- [Break music plays]
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Hello? Hey, Desmond, it's Sean. How's it going? Good. I hear you're on vacation. Is that true?
--:-- Desmond: It is. I'm in Bethany Beach, Delaware, in the United States of America, in North America, in the world.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Very nice. Did you bring any KiwiCo projects with you to Bethany Beach, Delaware?
--:-- Desmond: No, I finished the last one that I had, and I haven't got the August one yet.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: That's a bummer. You know, a thing I was thinking about is that, like, KiwiCo might hear these conversations that you and I have, and you could pretty much request anything.
--:-- Desmond: If they could send you anything right to the beach, what would you ask for?
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Well, it would be cool if they had whatever those machines are called. If they had one of those things that triggers another thing and it keeps going. Like a domino effect.
--:-- Desmond: And it does something random.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: You're talking about a Rube Goldberg machine, yeah?
--:-- Desmond: Yeah, Rube Goldberg. Okay, well, I hope they hook it up for you as a longtime subscriber.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: For all of those who want to try it out, you can do so for free. Fun for kids of all ages. Kiwico.com slash explain. That's K-I-W-I-C-O dot com slash explain.
--:-- Desmond: Desmond, invite me to the beach next time, okay?
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: I'll try. Not sure if my mom will allow that.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Chris Larimer, professor of political science at the University of Northern Iowa. How long has the Iowa State Fair been around?
--:-- Chris Larimer: It's been around, I think, since about 1854. And it's grown in popularity over time.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: But the real purpose of it is just sort of showcase the agricultural sector of the state.
--:-- Chris Larimer: And, you know, there are new attendance records set every year where, you know, we're at the point where it's pretty regular that we see over a million people attend the Iowa State Fair over that period.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: When exactly did the Iowa State Fair become important to politics?
--:-- Chris Larimer: I think when you look at the importance of the Iowa State Fair to politics, I think it coincides with sort of the popularity of or the attention given to the Iowa caucuses.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: So Jimmy Carter visited the Iowa State Fair when he was first running in 1976, and he is sort of credited with putting the Iowa caucuses on the map.
--:-- Chris Larimer: Since that time, candidates have used the Iowa State Fair to help them in their candidacies, because it's a way to sort of showcase yourself to a large group of people, people who are active just generally in the state of Iowa.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And so candidates have continued to use that. And so as the caucuses have become more popular, using the Iowa State Fair for political purposes for presidential candidates has also become more popular.
--:-- Chris Larimer: Have there been like really eventful presidential candidate visits to the Iowa State Fair? Or is it always kind of, you know, glad handling and deep fried Oreo eating and that kind of thing.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Well, yeah, there's certainly a lot of that. But I think Donald Trump's visit in 2015 has certainly got to be the most unique where he comes in, flies in in a helicopter, lands, takes a group of kids up in the helicopter to tour the state fairgrounds.
--:-- Chris Larimer: Quite a few children going to take rides today. So where are the children? Get them over here. That's great. I love children. I love Iowa. Great place.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: I mean, that has by far has to be the most unique visit by any candidate. But the other big one I think a lot of people look to is in 2011 when Mitt Romney visited the Iowa State Fair.
--:-- Chris Larimer: So the big part of the when the fair visit for candidates is that they do the Des Moines Register soapbox where they're up on the stand and giving speeches to a large crowd of people that are just gathered around.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Yeah, that's where Romney made the famous statement that corporations are people, too.
--:-- Chris Larimer: Of course they are. Everything corporations earn ultimately goes to people. So where do you think it goes?
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Do we have any idea how much the fair has an impact on the actual election?
--:-- Chris Larimer: No, it's a great question, but it's really hard to measure. You know, you have to be able to somehow measure, OK, who walked up to the soapbox that day? who listened to the candidates, you know, how long did that effect have on the individual voter, and did that influence their decision six months later, you know, in the Iowa caucuses?
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And that's really hard to do.
--:-- Chris Larimer: I think you could say there's potentially a small effect there in terms of voters seeing candidates they're thinking about considering caucusing for, and maybe if that candidate gives a performance on the soapbox that's appealing to that individual voter, then maybe over the next few weeks, they're more likely to follow that candidate.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: When they come to Iowa, maybe they're more likely to attend an event for that candidate. And then you know potentially they maybe more likely to caucus for that particular candidate
--:-- Chris Larimer: But it something that almost impossible to measure at this point
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: You mentioned that the fair sort of has its origins in showing off Iowa agricultural might What issues matter most to these fairgoers at the Iowa State Fair
--:-- Chris Larimer: On a general level, it's the same issues that matter to most people across the country in terms of just the direction of the country, you know, the economy, jobs, unemployment.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: But when you listen to the candidate soapbox speeches, you know, there's still a lot of talk about agriculture.
--:-- Chris Larimer: There's a lot of talk about middle class. And understand that we need strong farm policies and we don't need a president that is treating our rural areas and our farmers like they're a bunch of poker chips in one of his bankrupt casinos.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: More recently, a lot of talk about tariffs, the agricultural industry generally.
--:-- Chris Larimer: So I think, you know, those speeches, they're They're trying to appeal to the sector of Iowa's economy that they think that most voters see as most important to continuing to improve conditions in Iowa.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: I don't know. I guess you grew up in Iowa. You live in Iowa now. Do you attend the state fair, Chris?
--:-- Chris Larimer: I don't. I know, and this is really sad to admit publicly, but I don't attend it on a regular basis. I have a lot of people that do. My dad grew up just outside of Des Moines, so he would go there on a regular basis.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: I won't tell anyone. Yeah, please don't. It's sad to admit.
--:-- Chris Larimer: Is there a sense that the fair is unfair, that all of these candidates flocking to Iowa for a weekend and spending so much time there in the months leading up to the Iowa caucus biases their attention to one state that, you know, has three million people or so?
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Instead of covering the entire country and running around talking to voters who maybe have different needs.
--:-- Chris Larimer: Yeah, I think you could say that. I think there are two sides to that, right? I mean, it's the same question when it comes to the Iowa caucuses, right? Is it fair that Iowa gets that much coverage when it comes to the Iowa caucuses or the candidates spend that much attention on a state, as you said, where you're talking about 3 million people?
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: So on the one hand, you could say, no, it's not. It seems rather silly to spend that much time where you're talking about a small subset of voters and you don't even have any idea if any of these people are actually going to show up to caucus six months later.
--:-- Chris Larimer: On the other hand, you could say that it puts candidates on the spot a little bit and it forces them to talk to voters on a small scale basis. And it gives you a sense of whether or not these candidates are comfortable talking to voters, capable of that, you know, answering questions on the fly.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And it sort of shows their strengths or potential weaknesses as a candidate in terms of talking about the issues. And so it's really sort of this unscripted event, which appeals to a lot of people, because I think you talk to voters and they're kind of tired of the scripted responses or, you know, the scripted appearances, even thinking about the debates that we've seen.
--:-- Chris Larimer: Does Iowa ultimately end up picking who becomes president or at least who ends up on the ticket?
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Not necessarily. So Iowa does a good job. And a lot of people have talked about this, of sort of winnowing the field, right? We often talk about three tickets out of Iowa if you want to be the nominee, the exception being John McCain in 2008, who actually finished fourth in the Iowa caucuses, but of course went on to be the Republican nominee.
--:-- Chris Larimer: But between Democrats and Republicans, the Democrats actually do a much better job in terms of predicting the nominee. That is, who wins the Iowa caucuses? There's a better track record as far as the person who wins the Iowa caucuses on the Democratic side and their likelihood of going on to be the nominee.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And there's also a better track record between what happens in Iowa on the Democratic side and then what happens in New Hampshire a few days later in the New Hampshire primary.
--:-- Chris Larimer: On the Republican side, the record's not as good. And, you know, a lot of that goes back to the strong role of social conservatives, the evangelical vote in Iowa on the Republican side.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: You know, this year, what you'd expect is that they would at least winnow the field a bit, that after caucus night, you would expect to see a number of candidates drop out.
--:-- Chris Larimer: And you would expect the candidates that finished in the top three, maybe top four in Iowa, to have a pretty good chance of being the nominee.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And it's just around the corner in February of next year. Yeah, right. It's going to be a long six months.
--:-- Chris Larimer: Chris Larimer teaches politics at the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls, Iowa.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: I'm Sean Ramos from This is Today Explained.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Before we go, one last reminder that KiwiCo wants to spark joy and creativity and tinkering and learning in kids of all ages, starting with the kid that you know, kiwico.com slash explained is where you can check out their projects for kids of all ages, and you can even try them out for free. Kiwico.com slash explained.
