(Daily Signal)–The United States could collapse if it can’t control the border, says Jay Hayward, 68, of Grinnell, Iowa
“Illegal immigration, this is serious,” Hayward told The Daily Signal on Saturday while standing in line to attend a Donald Trump rally in Fort Dodge, Iowa.
“This is a great nation. If it doesn’t turn around soon, we could be looking at some sort of collapse,” he added. “Is there anyone other than me that feels like this is Rome 476 A.D.?”
But the border crisis isn’t his only concern. As a Chicago native, he said he’s also worried about election security.
“The rule of law; free, fair and open elections,” Hayward added. “I am from Chicago and I have seen them steal elections for most of my life.”
The Daily Signal talked to Iowa voters just less than two months away from the Jan. 15 Iowa caucuses about what are their most pressing concerns. Like Hayward, some named border security and election integrity. Still others talked about the economy and free speech as pressing issues that candidates should address in 2024.
“I’m tired of being censored, afraid to say something to offend people,” said Sheila Toms, 50, a resident of Lytton, Iowa, also while waiting in line to attend the Trump rally in Fort Dodge.
Toms said she was uncertain what could be done to hold Big Tech accountable. A woman standing next to her–who didn’t want to be interviewed–said, “Elon Musk needs to buy them all.”
“Amen,” Toms said to the Musk reference. She also answered, “More oversight. They are the new generation … Tech companies are how the kids are learning in school.”
The biggest problem facing the United States is the decline of constitutional government, said Michael Ames, 53, of Winterset, shortly after attending the Thanksgiving Family Forum on Friday in Des Moines, Iowa.
“I worry about us wandering away from our constitutional, Judeo-Christian roots,” Winterset told The Daily Signal. “So that’s a huge thing for me.”
The forum featured three presidential candidates—Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and Ohio businessman Vivek Ramaswamy—in a discussion of issues. The event was put on by The FAMiLY Leader, a Christian conservative organization, and The Daily Signal was the media sponsor.
Also attending was Jay Fox, 23, of Urbandale, Iowa, who supports the next president holding Big Tech companies accountable for meddling in the elections.
“They should hold Big Tech accountable, especially for election interference,” Fox said. “Big Tech should be like a town square for people to be able to speak their minds. I don’t like the censorship. I’m not a fan of it.”
Fox was disappointed about Ohio voters’ decision to add unrestricted abortion to the state’s constitution. However, he viewed it as a short term setback for the pro-life cause and doesn’t think conservative candidates will waver.
“I just think it wasn’t a good turnout,” he said of the Ohio referendum. “I still think candidates will double down on their pro-life stances.”
Fox said the last time the United States has been on the right track was 2019, or before the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We were on the right track, it seems like just a few years ago, right before COVID probably,” he said.
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However, Joel Duvall, 50, from Madrid, Iowa, said you would have to go back to the Ronald Reagan administration in the 1980s to find when the country was really on the right track.
“Reagan. We’ve had a few times where we were possibly on the right track but I think as a country, as a whole, when we were on the right track was under Reagan’s leadership,” said Duvall, who was also attending the Family Forum.
Most Iowa voters asked about the last time the country was heading in the right direction said it would have been just before the pandemic, or during the Trump administration.
Charles Daugherty, of Cedar Rapids, agreed with Duvall that it was during the Reagan administration.
The 77-year-old Daugherty also added he worried about a lack of respect in the United States.
“Both parties, we have to learn how to be civil to be able to discuss with a calm attitude what we believe because we are commanded to love,” Daugherty, who was attending the Family Forum, said. “Jesus was able to speak to people and they liked to hear what he had to say. He wasn’t condemning, didn’t call people names.”
He said political name calling can drive good people from political engagement.
“I have a young lad in the last election who was excited to vote in his first presidential election, but he didn’t vote because he felt that in the debates the candidates—two for president—were acting like eight-year-olds,” Daugherty said. “Now that is an opinion of our 20-somethings. We can’t have respect unless we give respect.”
The border could have far-reaching consequences for the country, said Alden Trotman, 48, who is a visiting nurse from Penedel, Pennsylvania and now living in Audubon, Iowa. He traveled to Fort Dodge to see the Trump event.
“You allow an unknown amount of people into the borders. We are the only country in the world that does this,” Trotman said. “You do that in Germany, Saudi Arabia, France, Italy, you do that in any other country, you are packed up and shipped out that day. Why should we be any different? If you earn the right to be here, God bless you. But don’t sneak in.”
Trotman said certain Big Tech firms were a problem.
“Some parts that are valuable, pushing medical advancements, technology, learning to advance people is a great thing,” he said. “To control and spy and try to influence what we do is not good technology. Tik Tok is a company run by China. Their version of Tik Tok in China has an algorithm that promotes people doing wonderful things. The same Tik Tok that we have, the algorithm promotes us to do silly things and the dumber we can be the funnier it gets and the funnier it gets the more we promote them. Education is not something that is promoted.”
Melissa Wnuk, a resident of Ames, Iowa attending the Trump rally, said the top issues are the economy, clean elections, and border security.
Elaine Vanwyk, 80, of Pella, Iowa, said despite the outcome in Ohio, she doesn’t believe the Republican presidential candidates seem to be backing down from the pro-life cause.
“As far as we’ve heard, they have a strong pro-life case, all the Republican candidates,” said Vanwyk, who attended the Family Forum with her husband Jerry.
Barbara Vaughn, a resident of Swea City, Iowa attending the Trump rally, named her top 2024 issues as “the economy, the wall, the illegal immigrants coming in … causing every type of problem.”
Jonathan DeRose, 31, a resident of Alta, Iowa, who traveled to the Trump rally, is concerned about free and fair elections.
“We all know—or most of us know—there was fraud going on,” DeRose said. “We need to do away with the system that would help the fraud go on.”
Dennis Longhenry, 72, of Webster City, Iowa, had some policy prescriptions for elections.
“No mail-in ballots, because I got six of them in 2020,” Longhenry, who was attending the Trump rally, said. “I was going to put Trump on every one of them, but I thought I’d go to jail. Also, if you’re not legal you don’t vote. If you’re not a citizen, you don’t vote.”
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Irony, a forum on Issues destroying America where people voice concern for the lack of adherence to our constitution… YET two of the candidates there are not natural born citizens but are naturalized from a congressional act… born with foreign parents and dual competing citizenships at birth and are NOT eligible to hold either the VP OR the President offices.
That’s called “foreign entanglements”.
Dingaling, dingaling . . .
“The United States could collapse if it can’t control the border, says Jay Hayward, 68, of Grinnell, Iowa.”
The USA collapsed long ago, dingaling!
“Fox was disappointed about Ohio voters’ decision to . . .”
The kid is 23 years old, so I will cut him some slack, but anyone over the age of 35 who still does NOT grasp that the elections are rigged, and there is NO WAY for a voter to verify their vote, is a complete clowntard! (George W. Bush signed the HAVA legislation to spread privatized voting systems across the nation, while further laws were enacted EXEMPTING ballots and ballot images from public disclosure laws, thereby making all elections a covert process!)
” . . .we were on the right track was under Reagan’s leadership . .”
The ONLY two recent presidents who actually bolstered and improved national security and the US military, were President John F. Kennedy and President Ronald Reagan!
JFK was slaughtered on Elm Street in Dallas 60 years ago on tomorrow’s date; the son of the Zapata Petroleum parter of VP George H.W. Bush attempted to assassinate Ronald Reagan — — hardly seems like a coincidence anymore . . .
Addenda: Apologies for going pedantic, but a little known, obscure fact about the Reagan assassination attempt — — a US Marshal attempted an unauthorized pickup of failed assassin, John Hinckley, Jr., supposedly to transport him to jail!?
The US Marshal, James Golden, was fired by the Reagan Administrion for doing this, but what was UNIQUE about James Golden? He was the former head of security at Lockheed in LA when Sen. Bobby Kennedy was assassinated there in 1968! The part-time security guard situated immediately behind RFK when he was shot from behind, was Gene Cesar (Thane Eugene Cesar), who worked in the classified section at Lockheed (Cesar was a CIA contractor)! James Golden previously worked for Robert Maheu, as did Gene Cesar also —— Maheu was the former ONI (Office of Naval Intelligence, oldest existing US intel outfit) guy who recruited Lee Oswald for the CIA’s False Defectors Program.
At the Ambassador Hotel where RFK was assinated, a young, attractive brunette lady was hanging around Sirhan all evening, Shirin Khan, the daughter of the former #3 guy with the Shah’s secret police, the SAVAK – two fellows near her were SAVAK operators, registered at the Ambassador Hotel. No doubt they were supposed to assassinate RFK and Gene Cesar would kill Sirhan, but Maheu’s plans didn’t always go like clockwork, after all!
After RFK’s assassination, James Golden would leave Lockheed and become the security chief with Nixon’s presidential campaign; Golden had previously been Vixe President Nixon’s Secret Service personal bodyguard!
Shirin Khan was labelled as the “girl in the polka dot dress” but the LAPD brought forth a completely different woman as their witness, Valerie Schulte, a young blonde student whose aunt and uncle worked in the same classified section at Lockheed as did Gene Cesar, that CIA contractor! Valerie Schulte’s father also had a CIA security clearance and was employed at the Technicolor Corporation, developing classified film from Lockheed Keyhole spy satellites and Lockheed spyplanes!
Election fraud could NOT exist with a true two party system. If it was all being done by one side, the other side would put a stop to it, or use it just as much as the other side. The uniparty system guarantees election fraud just like it guarantees open borders.