During a stump speech on Tuesday at a county GOP office, Hinson mentioned Trump just once.
Boone, Iowa — As she campaigns across her state for an open Senate seat, Representative Ashley Hinson has had to walk a strategic line around Donald Trump.
Thus far, Hinson has broken with the president on some key issues while taking care not to draw his ire by contradicting him on his most cherished policies. Speaking at a county Republican office on Tuesday, she touted many of the president’s more popular initiatives, such as border security and the tax cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, without making him a feature of her campaigning, even to a GOP audience.
“We have the most secure border in our country’s history because we’e worked with President Trump to get that done,” she said in a stump speech. That line constituted Hinson’s only mention of Trump. Instead of cheerleading for Trump, Hinson spent much the speech attacking her Democratic opponent Josh Turek.
Hinson, who is locked in a tight race with Turek, is one of several battleground Republican candidates this cycle who has been dragged down by unpopular policies from the Trump administration but who nonetheless cannot break with the president on them, lest she put off the GOP base or the White House.
Farmers have suffered from high diesel prices caused in part by the Iran war and increased input prices thanks to tariffs. The resulting poll numbers are spooking Republicans. In response, Hinson has separated herself from Trump slightly without fully repudiating him. She called for the war to come to “a successful and immediate end” without explaining how the administration could realize both of those two goals. However, she has not issued a similar break broadly on the tariffs the administration has levied, having said in a debate this month that America is “holding bad trade partners accountable when they are breaking the rules and not playing fair.”
But Hinson has criticized the president on issues Trump holds less dear to his heart. In August, she expressed disagreement with the president’s decision to ease tariffs on imported beef. She has also said Trump should not be using taxpayer money to run ads praising himself and knocked his deal to import diesel from Russia.
Unlike members of Trump’s cabinet and extended negotiating team, Hinson is unsparing in her assessment of Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, referring to him as a “murderous dictator” in comments to National Review. She did, however, reserve judgment on the decision, made by Elon Musk, to temporarily cut off the Starlink technology that Ukraine uses to defend itself from Russian attack.
“I think we just need to make sure that it’s not being used for nefarious purposes, no matter who made that decision,” she told NR. “What I don’t want to see is that technology be used to target and kill people, which I think was the impetus behind that change. But I also don’t believe that we need to let murderous dictators win these wars, and I look forward to continuing to hopefully bring these conflicts to an end as soon as possible.”
Even as she has broken from Trump on certain issues, Hinson is not distancing herself from him or other national Republicans. She rallied with the president last week, and RNC Chairman Joe Gruters joined her on Tuesday, warning of what would happen if Democrats took Congress.
“They’re going to investigate, they’re going to obstruct, and they’re going to impeach,” he said. “They’re not trying to run on any issues. They’re not trying to bring policy change other than these radical leftist [Democratic Socialists of America] views. They want to stop the president.”
In a brief interview, Gruters said having Trump on the campaign trail helps turn out the GOP base and Republican voters who do not always vote in midterms.
“What he does is he’s bringing this energy,” he told NR. “Listen, he started this movement when he went down those escalators. He’s delivered low-propensity voters three times, and in this cycle, he’s our best weapon.”