#WALKAWAY: At 80, lifelong Iowa Republican is voting for Biden: 'I do not like Trump's value system'

Sandy Hoenig of Winterset has been a straight-ticket Republican voter for the past 55 years. She's been active in the party since her early 20s, first as a 25-year Ames resident. Now 80, she has chaired county election committees for Sen. Chuck Grassley and former presidential candidate Mitt Romney, raised funds for former U.S. Rep Tom Latham and supported David Young, the Republican congressman who lost his seat to Cindy Axne and is now trying to get it back.

"No one in Madison County has a longer history with the Republicans than the Hoenigs," says Hoenig, who made her home in Winterset with her husband, Rick, nine years ago.

She isn't trading in her registration. She wouldn't consider voting for Bernie Sanders and has no use for socialism. She thinks Democrats are too interested in a "welfare state." She supports people's right to own guns but sees no need to own assault weapons. She still holds out hope the party of Abraham Lincoln, Bob Ray and Gerald Ford will come back.

Most of her votes this year will still go to Republicans, but of Trump, she says, "I do not like his value system." In an interview at her home Wednesday, the retired teacher and school counselor, who has a master's degree, cited her long career working with students in public and parochial school, and her Christian values.

"I see our children at risk if we have four more years of Trump," she said.

Hoenig represents several key demographics Biden has been polling higher with: people over 65, and suburban women. A Wall Street Journal poll Oct. 5 found Biden leading Trump by 14 percentage points overall and by 27 points among people 65 and older.

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