A leader of the ultraconservative House Freedom Caucus who spearheaded House Republicans’ impeachment inquiry of Democratic President Joe Biden will be a featured speaker at Iowa Republican U.S. Rep. Ashley Hinson’s annual barbecue campaign fundraiser.
Hinson, of Marion, announced Friday that Republican U.S. Reps. Tom Emmer of Minnesota, the House majority whip, and Jim Jordan of Ohio will speak at her fourth annual BBQ Bash this summer. Additional guests will be announced in the coming weeks, according to Hinson’s campaign.
The event will be held Aug. 3 at Hawkeye Downs in Cedar Rapids. Doors open at noon and the program starts at 1 p.m. Tickets can be purchased at ashleyhinson.com/bbq.
Jordan is a co-founding member of the House Freedom Caucus and a close ally of former President Donald Trump. He did not vote to certify Biden’s victory in the 2020 election, and as chair of the House Judiciary Committee, led the impeachment inquiry into Biden. The 15-month effort seeking to tie Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings to corruption on the part of his father has failed to turn up evidence that merits impeachment.
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Both Jordan and Emmer were contenders last year for House speaker in the scramble to succeed Kevin McCarthy, who was removed from the role in a historic ouster Oct. 3.
Iowa’s all-Republican U.S. House delegation voted for Jordan for speaker in his first bid. U.S. Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks voted for the Ohio Republican on the first ballot, but opposed him on the following two votes over concerns of whether he could unite the party. Miller-Meeks said the decision prompted death threats and a “barrage of threatening calls.”
Emmer withdrew from the speaker race hours after hours after winning an internal party nomination after Trump objected to his nomination.
Hinson, a former state lawmaker and former KCRG-TV news anchor, is running for a third term representing Northeast Iowa’s 2nd Congressional District. She faces Democratic challenger and small-business owner Sarah Corkery, of Cedar Falls, in the November election.
Emmer and Jordan praised Hinson in statements released by her campaign as a conservative fighter.
“We have to send Ashley back to Congress and re-elect President Trump so that we can save our country from Joe Biden and the Democrats,” Emmer said.
SANTORUM TO SPEAK: Former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum will be a featured speaker at the conservative Christian group The Family Leader’s annual conference July 12 in Des Moines.
The conference has been a magnet for Republican presidential candidates in recent years as they courted the evangelical vote ahead of the Iowa caucuses. Santorum won the 2012 Iowa GOP caucuses.
He joins Betsy DeVos, former U.S. education secretary under then-President Donald Trump; Joel C. Rosenberg, a Christian author who covers news in Israel and the Middle East; and Egyptian American pastor Michael Youssef.
The group has also invited President Joe Biden and Trump to the event, along with independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, according to its website.
Besides winning the Iowa GOP presidential caucuses in 2012, Santorum won 10 additional states and nearly 4 million votes that year. He served two terms in both the U.S. House and U.S. Senate.
He currently serves as a senior adviser at Convention of States, pushing to amend the Constitution to limit the size and scope of the federal government, require a balanced federal budget and place term limits on elected federal officials.
Tickets and more information about the summit can be found at thefamilyleader.com/fls24.
