on. joining us is bachmann campaign press secretary, alice stewart. thanks for joining us right now. >> great to be with you. >> yesterday michele bachmann had a town hall meeting, donald trump appeared via telephone conference on that but there was no endorsement from him at that time. meanwhile. mitt romney is being endorsed by people like chris christie. isn't the gulf of the top tier candidates just that, and congressman bachmann here growing larger? >> endorsements are fantastic. it's great to have endorsements from people like chris christie, but it's more important to have the votes. as you mentioned, august 13th we won the straw poll, which is the first good indicator of how a candidate stands with the open electorate, as opposed to other straw polls have been with a specific group. since that time we have expanded our operations in iowa.