Democrats who traveled all the way from Washington, D.C., to Perry in order to knock on doors Sunday in support of Congressional candidate Lanon Baccam were met with sunny skies and bracing autumn weather.
Knocking on Perry doors were Christie Vilsack, wife of the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture and former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, and Anne Knapke, until recently a deputy chief of staff in Vilsack’s USDA office in the U.S. capital.
“I’ve known Lanon since he was a little boy,” said Christie Vilsack, a Mount Pleasant native like Baccam. She taught English and journalism at the high school and college level and also reported for the Mount Pleasant News.
Knapke and Baccam were both deputy chiefs of staff in Vilsack’s USDA. Baccam, a veteran of the U.S. Army, also served during the Obama administration as Vilsack’s deputy under secretary for Farm and Foreign Agricultural Services (FFAS) and as the USDA Military Veterans Agricultural Liaison.
Vilsack and Knapke were joined by local statehouse candidates, Margaret Liston of Ogden, who is running for the Iowa Senate District 24 seat, and Joe Shelly of Perry, who seeks election to the Iowa House District 47 seat, and by Monica Peitz of Perry, chair of the Perry-Area Democrats.
Juan Ordonez of Perry was among the enthusiastic Democrats whom the canvassers encountered. Ordonez, a resident of Iowa since 1995, earned his U.S. citizenship in 2021. He said many people in the Latino community are concerned about Republican threats of mass deportations that would follow the election of Donald Trump.
Trump virtually vetoed a bipartisan immigration bill in February, preferring to exploit the tactical value to his campaign of whipping up fear and hatred of immigrants instead of working to solve the border problems. Immigration has always been the central plank of Trump’s platform, and his hatred has ramified through all the obedient Trumplings at the state and local levels.
Other issues in the canvassers portfolio were promoting rural economic development and defending women’s reproductive rights and public schools from further attacks by Republicans.
