HUCKABEE'S WAITING GAME. Des Moines, Ia. -- Rather than kicking his Iowa campaign up a notch, second-place Ames Straw Poll finisher Gov. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas downsized his Iowa operation to just three paid staffers in the wake of his low-budget achievement.
"Right now were back down to three. We had, gosh 16 or 18 here for the Straw Poll," Huckabee Iowa campaign manager Eric Woolson told the Iowa Indepenent. "Those folks have kind of scattered to the four winds."
Woolson, who also serves as the Iowa campaign's communications director and press secretary, said the lean campaign had imported much of the rest of its pre-Ames staff from other Huckabee offices around the nation in the weeks leading up to the Straw Poll. "We had four folks out from New Hampshire, we probably had 8 or 10 people from Little Rock, so we probably had closer to 20. This pace was packed!" he said, gesturing around the campaign's small downtown Des Moines headquarters, which has plate-glass windows that overlook a busy street and advertise the candidate to passersby. "Some full-time volunteers came in from a couple of different states, so we were really packed for the Straw Poll."
"Obviously, we'll ramp back up for caucus time," he continued.
Huckabee, who will return to Iowa next week for The Lance Armstrong Presidential Cancer Forum in Cedar Rapids, has been traveling widely since coming in second in the poll and is making the most of his national media appearances, which the campaign says are helping to bring in much-needed financing.
"Iowa is not really a fertile state for fundraising," Woolson explained. "Iowans expect you to spend money, not raise money."
"Money doesn't replace time, it doesn't replace message, it doesn't replace grassroots orginazation," he added. "It can buy you some grassroots organization."
Endorsements have also started to pour in, he said, though for now the campaign is keeping the Iowa ones under wraps.
The campaign today announced a string of New Hampshire endorsements following a Huckabee visit to the Granite State.
--Garance Franke-Ruta
