Joni Ernst: Is Iowa About To Elect Its First Female Senator?

Joni Ernst will become the first female Senator from Iowa if the midterm 2014 vote tallies go her way. The Iowa Republican recently met with members of the Alpha Gamma Rho fraternity at Iowa State University and a protest broke out, according to tweets from the National Review.

Ernst was likely quite surprised when about 20 people at the Alpha Gamma Rho fraternity stood and began chanting about the Koch brothers and against her candidacy. Although the Koch brothers landed on spot 32 on the list of heavy hitter political donors groups, well below many Democratic donors, the siblings are often the target of liberal politicians and Democratic candidate supporters voicing angst about the influence big money has on elections.

The largest political donor group has contributed 100 percent to Democratic candidates. Act Blue reportedly gave $34,052,722 to Democratic candidates in the last elections cycle. Goldman Sachs is next on the big donors list and donated to the blue team 25 percent of the time. The Senate Conservatives Fund obviously went the GOP entirely, and landed in spot three on the political donor groups list. Next comes Comcast, with gave to Democrats 61 percent of the time. The next six big donors gave to Democrats at least 28 percent of the time and as much as 65 percent of the time for some donors.

The Joni Ernst frat house protest over the Koch brothers and her policies were short-lived. According to Benny Johnson tweets, the Iowa State University fraternity members kicked the protesters, who were still chanting loudly, out of the house.

The woman poised to possibly become the next Iowa Senator was unphased by the protest and Koch brothers chants. “Don’t worry folks; I’ve seen worse. But it was in Iraq,” Joni Ernst reportedly said when working to calm down the crowd. “What the military taught me is to stay calm in these situations.”

The Republican candidate was a Lt. Colonel in the Iowa National Guard. She reportedly command the largest battalion in Iowa. She also served as a company commander during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Ernst’s unit was ordered to run convoys through southern Iraq and Kuwait.

Democratic Senator Tom Harkin recently likened Joni Ernst to Taylor Swift and made a comment about her appearance. The comments, which have been deemed sexist by some, angered her supporters and many political news show hosts from both sides of the aisle.

“I was very offended that Sen. Harkin would say that. I think it’s unfortunate that he and many of their party believe you can’t be a real woman if you’re conservative and you’re female. I believe if my name had been John Ernst attached to my resume, Senator Harkin would not have said those things,” the GOP candidate said.

Harkin ultimately walked back his comments and said the statements were a mistake.

http://youtu.be/I3mG9fNOZp4

Do you think the results of the midterm 2014 ballots will make Joni Ernst the first female Senator from Iowa?

[Image via Screengrab/Huffington Post]