Trump is poised to dominate Iowa caucuses despite barely campaigning there

The usual path to victory in the Iowa caucuses — the first Republican presidential nominating contest in the nation — involves meeting voters in cozy living rooms and greasy Pizza Ranches, marching in small-town parades and flipping pork chops at the Iowa State Fair, all while taking endless questions about immigration policy, abortion and ethanol subsidies.

Former President Trump hasn’t done any of that. He has spent a sliver of the time his 2024 GOP presidential rivals have in the state, holding a handful of rallies and avoiding being grilled by voters. Yet in every recent poll of Iowa Republicans, he holds what would appear to be an insurmountable lead — a reflection of his unique status as both a universally known persona and a former president.

“He’s the most famous person in the world. He’s a celebrity,” said David Kochel, a long-time GOP operative who advised Mitt Romney’s and Jeb Bush’s presidential campaigns. “He’s never been required to play by the same rules as everyone else.”

And yet Trump’s strategy still carries risk. He lost the caucuses in 2016 to the less-famous but better-organized Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, and if former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley or Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is able to pull off an upset on Jan. 15 — or even outperform the polls and come in a close second to the former president — Trump’s supporters will have reason to question his political decision-making. And that could have ramifications in the nominating contests in New Hampshire, South Carolina and beyond.

Though the former president doesn’t hold town halls or take questions from voters, Kochel argued that Trump is running a “quasi-incumbent campaign” and has a far more organized ground game to drive his supporters to the caucuses than he did in 2016.

“His team can do a lot without him — substantially more,” Kochel said, adding that he could not imagine another candidate replicating Trump’s dominance in the state with such a minimal personal effort. “He is a singular political actor. … Trump is Trump. He’s unique. He’s a unicorn.”

As of Wednesday, Trump had held 16 events in the state in this presidential contest, according to the Des Moines Register’s candidate tracker.

DeSantis has visited voters in each of the state’s 99 counties, completing the “full Grassley,” a term taken from longtime Iowa Sen. Charles E. Grassley’s travels every year. Haley has held more than 50 events across the state, and entrepreneur and long shot Vivek Ramaswamy has held more than DeSantis and Haley combined, according to the Register.

Trump’s rivals and their allies have pointed to the candidates’ efforts to meet Iowans across the state as one of the reasons caucusgoers should support them instead of the former president.

“Gov. DeSantis was the only candidate that made the commitment to go to all 99 counties,” Iowa’s popular GOP Gov. Kim Reynolds told her Florida counterpart’s supporters earlier this month at the Thunderdome event center in Newton, near Des Moines. “Today we get to celebrate delivering on that promise, right here in Jasper County! No. 99!”

DeSantis, whose appeals to Iowans include pledging to move the federal Department of Agriculture to the state, also highlighted his barnstorming of Iowa.

“The fact that I’m willing to do this, that should show you that I consider myself a servant, not a ruler,” DeSantis said. “That’s how people who get elected should consider themselves.”

This personal pitch, which has made the difference in prior caucuses between well-funded and well-known politicians and sleeper candidates who put in the time and effort to meet Iowans on their home turf, appears to have made no difference this time around — at least in polls.

Trump leads his Republican rivals by more than 30 percentage points, according to a RealClearPolitics average of Iowa polls. His average lead in national polls is even higher.

Many political experts have predicted that the anti-Trump GOP vote will consolidate as the field shrinks. Instead, Trump’s strength has grown.

The former president had the support of 51% of likely Iowa Republican caucus attendees in a survey released last week that was conducted by a venerable Iowa pollster for the Register, NBC News and Mediacom. Trump’s standing grew by 8 percentage points from a similar poll in October.

Earlier this month, he crowed about the “overflow” throngs of people at his events, compared with the numbers that turn out for his rivals.

“We have crowds that are incredible in Iowa,” Trump told about 900 supporters at an event hosted by Fox News host Sean Hannity in Davenport. “Other candidates have seven people standing on a farm and they’re talking,” he said. “It’s a very nice thing to watch, especially for me. I enjoy watching that.”

Still, Trump is urging his supporters to turn out to caucus.

“We have to put big numbers up — really big numbers,” he said at a rally in a Coralville hotel ballroom on Wednesday. “We are leading by a lot, but you have to go out and vote. That margin of victory is so, so powerful.”

Trump can command overwhelming support in Iowa without extensive campaigning because his backers are “not worried about policy,” said Tim Hagle, a political science professor at the University of Iowa. The criminal indictments that the former president is facing only increase his most ardent fans’ affection for him, Hagle added.

“A lot of his supporters believe he is the victim of political persecution,” he said. “They let the rest go and say, ‘OK, maybe he’s not doing the work, but we love him.’”

For Trump to dominate the actual caucuses as dramatically as he has the polls will require those supporters to turn out for the state’s in-person nominating contest on what is often a blisteringly cold, snowy winter night.

Never Back Down, a super PAC for DeSantis, has a significant operation in Iowa, and has transferred staff there from California. Haley’s supporters acknowledge that she has a smaller team, but are optimistic that a recent endorsement from Americans For Prosperity, a well-funded conservative nonprofit with staff in Iowa, will narrow DeSantis’ organizational edge.

Trump remains the wild card. His national presidential campaign, by all accounts, is more professional and organized than it was in 2016, and has detailed data about the former president’s supporters in the state.

At recent events, videos detailing how to caucus were played as volunteers collected commit-to-caucus cards signed by attendees. Other Trump backers are reaching out to likely supporters by phone or knocking on their doors.

“The caucuses are all about organization. But Trump defies most logic, even as he has an overwhelming media presence,” said Doug Gross, a prominent GOP attorney in Des Moines who recently endorsed Haley.

“The folks that are supporting Trump — if they aren’t told they have to get to caucus on a certain night, they’ll stay at the bar,” Gross added. “He has to have an organization.”