Then there was the fact that turnout was dampened by the most bitterly cold weather ever recorded on a caucus night. Temperatures here in Des Moines were minus-4 degrees, and felt like minus-22 with the wind factored in. In some rural areas of the state, they were even lower.
But this year’s result was so lopsided — and so in line with the national trend lines that are forming — that it does appear to augur what lies ahead in a Republican race that is likely to be wrapped up early in the primary season. President Biden’s campaign is already on a general-election footing for a battle with Trump, a rematch of two unpopular leaders that Americans are decidedly unenthused to see.
So clear was Trump’s Iowa victory that the Associated Press called the race a scant half-hour after the caucuses began. Its declaration came so early that, in some of the state’s 1,657 precincts, the preliminary speeches on behalf of the candidates were still underway, and caucus-goers had not yet had an opportunity to write the names of their preferred candidates on slips of paper.
That the GOP is now Trump’s party is not exactly news. But comparing the sweeping Iowa results of 2024 to those of 2016, when he narrowly lost here to Sen. Ted Cruz (Tex.), put the depth and breadth of that takeover into stark relief.
In CNN’s survey of Iowans as they entered the caucuses, two-thirds indicated that they believe Biden’s 2020 victory over Trump was illegitimate — which is a lie that the former president has ceaselessly propagated.
And with the GOP front-runner in the unprecedented situation of campaigning while under 91 felony charges, about 6 in 10 said they would consider Trump fit for the presidency even if he were convicted. By many measures, Trump has turned his legal problems into an electoral asset, with a Republican base that is embracing his claims to be a victim of a legal system that has been turned into a weapon against him.
The result also underscored how ineffectual his chief opponents, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley, have been. It turns out — who knew? — that cowering in Trump’s giant shadow is not a formula for success. Both were more than 30 percentage points behind Trump as they battled it out for the dubious right to claim a distant second place.
Haley’s disappointing third-place finish, after showing a small surge in late polling in Iowa, is not likely to provide the boost that she was hoping to see as the race heads to New Hampshire, where she ostensibly has a greater chance of gaining ground with its more moderate, independent-minded electorate.
For DeSantis — once considered to have the potential to be a formidable challenger to Trump — the Iowa result was likely a mortal blow, even though he came in slightly ahead of Haley. He has been an unappealing candidate with a dysfunctional campaign, and it is hard at this point to see how and where he can regroup.
Trump, already unpopular with the national electorate at large, is running ever harder to the right, boasting ever louder of how he would trample democratic norms in a second term in which retribution and vengeance would be his guiding principles of governance.
But even the figures in his party who once resisted are falling into line. And his victory is Iowa is likely to be followed by a string of others, equally decisive. The time for wishcasting that something — or someone — can stop him from making it to the November ballot as the Republican standard-bearer is coming to an end.
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