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Rod Roberts
Former GOP gubernatorial hopeful Rod Roberts of Carroll believes there is still a 50 percent chance Sioux City businessman Bob Vander Plaats will jump back into the race for governor this fall as an independent or third-party candidate.
In an interview with KCIM-AM, Roberts said he has not spoken with Vander Plaats since the June 8 Republican primary. That night, Former Gov. Terry Branstad won his party’s nomination, with Vander Plaats finishing second and Roberts a distant third. So far, Vander Plaats has refused to endorse Branstad’s candidacy and is openly mulling an independent run this fall. At the Republican Party of Iowa’s statewide convention last month, Vander Plaats supporters attempted to force Branstad to pick his former rival to be his running mate. The effort failed, and state Sen. Kim Reynolds of Osceola got the nod.
“I would guess at this point its probably a 50-50 proposition as to whether Bob Vander Plaats actually runs as an independent or third party candidate, and I think two overriding considerations [are] probably what Bob is mulling over – can I win and can I raise the finances necessary to compete with [incumbent Gov.] Chet Culver and former Gov. Terry Branstad,” Roberts said.
Roberts said he hopes Vander Plaats will decide against an independent candidacy. But ultimately it is Branstad’s job to ensure the party reunites after a divisive primary.
“I do believe that in the Republican Party we had a very dynamic and spirited primary campaign,” he said. “The challenge for the nominee, Gov. Branstad, who won the nomination with only 50 percent of the votes cast, he has to articulate a compelling, and I think conservative, message to Republicans in order to draw all of the base together into the fall general election campaign.”
That effort took a hit last week when lieutenant governor nominee Reynolds suggested that if Republicans are successful at overturning the Iowa Supreme Court’s 2009 ruling that legalized same-sex marriage, she would be open to the idea of civil unions. Vander Plaats made the marriage issue a central focus of his campaign, and many of his supporters were highly critical of Branstad’s running mate appearing to support legal recognition of same-sex relationships.
Roberts said a Vander Plaats candidacy would hurt Branstad, but he’s confident he would still be successful this fall.
“I don’t think he necessarily loses,” he said, adding: “But I think it makes the task more challenging for him.”
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