Ernst has stormed Iowa Senate race with a 'Squeal'

DES MOINES — Iowa may be on the cusp of making history by picking a woman for the first time as the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate.

The five-way GOP race for Iowa's rare open U.S. Senate seat has boiled down to Joni Ernst, a hog-castrating, Harley-riding state senator and combat veteran, versus Mark Jacobs, a millionaire retired investment banker and energy industry CEO, several polls have shown.

In the lead and at the center of attention is Ernst, whose struggling campaign suddenly became competitive two months ago after she released a testes-themed television commercial that was mocked by liberals and late-night comedians, but embraced by Iowa conservatives.

In it, Ernst said she has experience "cutting pork" because she grew up on a farm castrating hogs.

After Sarah Palin, the 2008 GOP vice presidential nominee, saw "Squeal," she said: "I haven't been this excited about a candidate in quite a while." Palin stumped for Ernst in Iowa this month, telling anti-establishment conservatives that "we can trust her." Palin's endorsement was a key part of the Ernst campaign's narrative that a consensus had solidified that Ernst was the best candidate for the fall.

Ernst has since become the topic of most Senate race ads running on Iowa TV, with some for her, some against.

The winner of the June 3 primary will face U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley, a four-term congressman who faces no Democratic opponent. The nominees will compete to replace retiring Democrat Tom Harkin, a 30-year senator who is the liberal lion of Iowa's congressional delegation. The general election landscape tilted heavily in Braley's favor until he was caught on tape in March disparaging GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley as just an Iowa farmer. The gaffe thrilled Republicans, who saw new hope for winning the seat. The race is now considered a toss-up, according to a Washington Post forecast.

It had been a low-interest race, populated with second- and third-tier candidates who jumped in after all of Iowa's best-known Republican elected officials opted out. And the race remains fluid — as many as 30% of likely primary-goers remain undecided, according to public and internal campaign polling.

"I think people will decide very late," said GOP strategist Christopher Rants, who is backing Jacobs.

Jacobs' TV ad spending has already dwarfed his opponents' — he has sunk $2 million of his own money in the campaign — but as he slips in the polls, ad-tracking records show he's doubling down with more.

"He has spent a considerable amount of personal funds in this race, and it remains to be seen if it was well spent," said strategist Robert Haus, who is unaffiliated with any of the Senate campaigns.

Jacobs' backers hope the race will tighten as his TV ads reveal Ernst's record in the Iowa Senate.

Also, Ernst's second TV ad, "Shot," in which she points a gun at the camera, was a Palinesque run to the right that may have hurt her with some women voters, Jacobs backers contend.

"The edginess of the ad, while attractive to the most hard-core Republicans, may not make that great of a first impression among the independents needed to win in the fall," Rants said.

Remaining at the back of the pack are three other candidates: college professor/talk- show host Sam Clovis, a religious conservative; former U.S. Attorney Matt Whitaker, a tea party stalwart; and car dealership manager Scott Schaben, a long shot with no staff who skewers his opponents with witty barbs. The three have been unable to raise enough money to compete with the confluence of events that has driven the momentum to Ernst.

The final weeks of the GOP primary campaign are expected to bring a thunderstorm of campaigning by television.

The Jacobs campaign's TV buys for the month of May alone total $922,000, according to advertising trackers.

Jacobs was considered the tentative front-runner when he began statewide advertising in December, but public polling in early April showed him neck-and-neck with Ernst. A May 12 to May 13 Loras College poll put Ernst at 31% and Jacobs at 19%, with 29% undecided.

Brian Dumas, Jacobs' campaign manager, said most of that polling "was completed prior to the airing of our ads exposing Senator Ernst's record of voting to raise taxes, so it's no longer an accurate reflection of the race."

None of Iowa's GOP U.S. Senate candidates has hit the magic 35% mark in polling. If no one reaches that threshold on primary night, the decision goes to activists at the Republican state convention, where the odds would be in Ernst's favor. Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad and his campaign team recently engineered a takeover of the state convention delegates, and many of Branstad's top supporters work for Team Ernst.