Tagged: On The Road

Well, that's two states down, at least one more to go.

I'm flying out of Manchester today for the final time. I'll join up with Governor Rick Perry, who is already campaigning in South Carolina. His dismissal of the fist primary state was obvious over the weekend. After both of the two weekend debates here, there were just a couple of reporters waiting to talk with Perry surrogates in the debate "Spin Room."

The reporters covering Rick Perry's presidential campaign have, from time to time, complained about a lack of advance notice from the campaign on events. There have been instances of last-second news conferences called where the national media have been unable to attend. And even on a good week, reporters only found out about campaign stops about seven days ahead of time.

Then the bus tour happened. It was a luxury. Sure we didn't get final dates until about a week before it began, but once it did...there were no planes to catch, no cars to rent, and the campaign even told us way ahead of time which hotels to book.

Today ends the Rick Perry Faith, Jobs and Freedom bus tour.

Well, mostly...

This was supposed to be the end, but the campaign added a final day, January 2nd, to the tour. That final blitz will see the governor finally visit Perry, Iowa, A town the Texas Tribune's Emily Ramshaw and I visited on our own back in September while following Perry on the campaign trail.

The latest polls from Iowa have Texas Governor Rick Perry, former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich essentially in a tie. Each candidate is within striking distance of 3rd place. And each could just a easily finish 5th.

And you can see the optimism in the Perry campaign staff. A little most jump in their step and a little more seriousness as they go about their work.

You can also see it in the number of reporters covering Governor Perry.

There's a big difference covering a campaign you know is going nowhere, and covering one that is back in the spotlight and getting additional media attention.

The two weeks leading up to Christmas are usually filled with holiday parties and last minute shopping trips. But not if you’re on a bus far from home, trailing a presidential candidate through another state. 

Today is the final day of campaigning for Rick Perry before Christmas. We’ll make three stops today...then back to Des Moines for flights back home. (Some of the reporters are heading to Zombie Burger tonight, one of the press corps favorite Des Moines hang outs.)

So here’s a round-up of some of the towns we saw along the trail this week – and what each is famous for.

So I’ve been on the Rick Perry "Faith, Jobs and Freedom" bus tour for almost a week now. The number of reporters has fluctuated during the trip, but we’ve there's been 7 news organizations on the bus the whole trip. ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News, The Des Moines Register, Texas Tribune and KUT.

So for this week’s edition of the KUT/Texas Tribune Tribcast, we’re recording from the back of the bus. Going over what we’ve seen, how the campaign is doing and what we expect come caucus night.

The days on the Rick Perry bus tour are packed for the candidate – and for the press corps packed on the bus behind him.

After each event, reporters jump back on their bus and try to write, edit video and audio, and post updates, blogs and reports to the web. Then it’s back off the bus for another event. The cycle repeats itself about four or five times a day.

Some days it’s easier than others, particularly posting to the web on a bus touring through some less-than-wired outposts. This morning we had a little change of pace and holiday cheer. Perry press person Katherine Cesinger brought the movie Elf on the bus. She popped it into the player and we watched during our hour-long drive to the first campaign stop of the day.