Donald Trump’s landslide victory in Iowa paves the way for his nomination as the Republican presidential candidate
The likelihood of Ron DeSantis or Nikki Haley pulling off a surprise win has fallen after the former president defeated them by more than 30 points
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis campaigned for months in all of Iowa’s 99 counties. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy visited them twice. But it was former president Donald Trump who nearly won in all 99 counties. He lost by one vote — 1,271 to 1,270, according to the provisional count — against Nikki Haley in Johnson County, which is home to the University of Iowa. If it weren’t for that vote, Trump would have achieved a perfect victory in the Iowa caucuses. His overwhelming win, with 51% of the votes, has practically knocked out his rivals in the first round and paved the way for his nomination as the Republican Party’s candidate for the presidential elections on November 5, 2024.
In his victory speech, Trump had nice words for everyone except the president, Democrat Joe Biden. Although the primary race has just begun, Trump already sees himself competing against Biden to win the White House. The Iowa caucuses have shown that the Republican rank-and-file overwhelmingly support the former president, regardless of the scandals and criminal charges against him. His result was a record for a candidate who was not the incumbent president. He is around 30 points ahead of DeSantis (who won 21.2%) and has an even greater lead over Haley (19.1%). As if that were not enough, the fourth in contention, the millennial Trumpist Vivek Ramaswamy (7.7%) has thrown in the towel and offered his support to the former president.
Trump has taken 20 of the 40 delegates up for grabs in Iowa, but he has achieved much more than that. He has shown that the polls giving him a 50-point lead across the country are accurate. He has validated his strategy of not participating in the primary debates with the other candidates and campaigning as if he were the incumbent president. He has made the most of his court hearings by presenting himself as a martyr (on Tuesday, he appeared in New York in a defamation case). He has rallied support by vindicating the January 6, 2021 assault on the Capitol and calling the convicted rioters “hostages.” With his undisputed charisma and leadership, his voters are passionately committed to the cause. He has made it clear that there is hardly any room for surprise.
After Iowa, the next stop is New Hampshire. Haley, former U.S. ambassador to the U.N., had hoped to come in second place in Iowa to present herself as the rising star before the primary in New Hampshire, where she is polling at more than 30% (Trump is at more than 40%). In New Hampshire, Haley has the support of the governor, Chris Sununu, and will likely win over the voters of Chris Christie, the anti-Trump candidate who dropped out of the race. However, after the Iowa result, there is a feeling that the race is a foregone conclusion.
Trump won in Iowa amid low turnout. Monday’s polar cold, with temperatures below 20 degrees below zero, meant that many people stayed at home. Just over 110,000 votes were counted, far from the more than 180,000 in 2016 and even below the 120,000 in 2020, when there was hardly any interest in the race, since the then-president had no real competition.
Trump, who asked his supporters to vote for him even if they died trying, had the most enthusiastic followers, according to polls. Haley had the least mobilized, and that may have relegated her to third place. Although in theory the cold and snow made it more difficult for rural voters, Trump has shown that he is also the favorite of city-dwelling Republicans.
His support is somewhat lower among moderate Republican voters, who partly favor Haley, and among anti-abortion activists, who prefer DeSantis, according to polls this Monday in Iowa. Trump also has somewhat less support among young people.
Biden vs. Trump
“Looks like Donald Trump just won Iowa. He’s the clear front runner on the other side at this point. But here’s the thing: this election was always going to be you and me vs. extreme MAGA Republicans. It was true yesterday and it’ll be true tomorrow,” Joe Biden posted on X, after the results were known.
Meanwhile, Haley has been trying to link Trump and Biden. “They have more in common than you think,” she told her followers on Monday in her post-caucus speech. After pointing out that both are around 80 years old (Biden is 81 and Trump is 77), she added: “Trump and Biden both lack a vision for our country’s future, because both are consumed by the past, by investigations, by vendettas, by grievances,” she said. This Tuesday, her campaign began airing ads in New Hampshire with those messages.
DeSantis breathed a sigh of relief when he came in second place, but his prospects in New Hampshire are poor. He hasn’t thrown in the towel yet, but no one sees him beating Trump. Iowa was in theory the perfect state for him: white, conservative, religious... If he was 30 points behind Trump there, where can he beat him?
Trump hasn’t had much time to celebrate his victory. On Tuesday, he had to attend a court hearing in New York, where he is facing a civil lawsuit for defaming writer E. Jean Carroll after he denied he sexually assaulted her in the 1990s. The former president has described the case as “pure fiction,” even though he was convicted of the charges in an earlier case. “After a historic win in Iowa, I am going to the Biden encouraged Witch Hunt in Lower Manhattan to fight against a FAKE Case from a woman I have never met, seen, or touched,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Naturally, it starts right after Iowa, and during the very important New Hampshire primary where, despite their sinister attempts, I will be tonight! It is a giant election interference scam, pushed and financed by political operatives.”
Trump’s victory in Iowa was so resounding that the Associated Press and the data teams of most television stations declared him the winner just 30 minutes after the caucuses begun — before some had even started voting. The AP — the benchmark on this matter — said that the initial results from eight counties showed Trump with an insurmountable lead.
Unlike primaries, in caucuses, there are generally no ballot boxes — participants collect the votes in an informal way — nor a fixed time for voting to end. Some caucuses may end in a few minutes, while others may take time to determine the outcome. AP announces the result when it believes that there are no doubts about who the winner will be. And this time, there were no doubts.
Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get more English-language news coverage from EL PAÍS USA Edition