The presidential candidate eats a pork chop and poses for selfies at arguably the most famous stop along the campaign trail as he tries to lift sagging poll numbers

Jeb Bush may be languishing at only 4% in the polls in Iowa, but the Republican presidential candidate was received as a celebrity at the state fair on Friday.

The former Florida governor could not take more than a few steps without shouts of “Hey Jeb” and demands for selfies as he wandered the fairway, eating a deep-fried Snickers bar and a pork chop on a stick.

The fair is one of the biggest attractions in the state, drawing millions of attendees, and is an essential stop for political candidates of both parties seeking to appeal to Iowans in the run-up to their crucial caucus in February. Almost every Democratic and Republican candidate is expected to attend in the coming days. 

He even broke away from his campaign staffers toward the end of the morning to test out his pitching arm (he topped out at 47 mph).

One vendor, Glenda Houkridge, went out of her way to throw Bush a free bag of her popcorn (or “karma corn”, as she called it). The two then had a minor dispute. He offered to pay for it, but she didn’t want him to do so. Eventually, despite her protests, Bush threw a few dollar bills down but atoned for this by kissing her hand. Afterwards, Houkridge described Bush’s courtly gesture as “a treat” and noted he was the only candidate to whom she would give free popcorn.

The informality reached a peak when, during his stump speech at the Des Moines Register’s soapbox, Bush gave out his personal email address, jeb@jeb.org. Needless to say, with the reference to email, the former Florida governor went out of his way to contrast his style with that of Hillary Clinton. He added: “I campaign the way I would govern. Out amongst everybody. No rope lines.” (The Clinton campaign famously penned in reporters with rope during a Fourth of July parade in New Hampshire earlier this summer.)

But Bush wasn’t a stereotypical “happy warrior”, feeding off the crowds. He showed occasional moments of testiness and a winking self-awareness of the fact that any human interaction that took place in a bubble of roughly 50 journalists was at least somewhat artificial. When appearing with Iowa’s two Republican senators, Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst, he rolled his eyes when a journalist asked if the senators, who have pledged to stay neutral, were endorsing his candidacy.

At one point, surrounded by reporters, Bush sighed: “I can actually see real people over the horizon. I’m sure at some point people will be tired of surrounding me but that’ll be later on.”

Yet Bush found time to connect one on one with voters, talking about his Catholic faith over beers with Chris McLynden, who signed on to be a county chair for the Florida governor’s campaign. The former Florida governor recalled his classes when he was preparing to convert to Catholicism being made up of “regular people, really lovers of Jesus” and described them as a “phenomenal way to get over losing a very close election” – in his case, the 1994 race for Florida governor.

The question for Bush is whether he can turn around his sagging poll numbers in the Hawkeye State. He pledged he would be competitive in Iowa and noted that his father, George HW Bush, who won the 1980 Iowa caucuses, was an asterisk in the polls at this point in the 1980 election. But the family brand is a mixed bag for Bush’s candidacy. While one heckler shouted at Bush during his speech at the soapbox about his brother’s record in Iraq, others seemed to like Bush because of his brother and, especially, his father.

Bill Hebert of Norwalk, Iowa, got Bush’s attention by shouting “We love you, Jeb” at him. After a brief chat with the presidential hopeful, he said he liked Bush “because I think he tells it like its is. He has a plan”. Herbert added that he had always been a fan of the Bush family, especially George HW Bush, whom he described as his hero.

Bush’s dilemma is how to appeal to those voters who do not hold his family in such high regard. But he is certainly trying – one handshake and one selfie at a time.