Results of first Republican presidential nominating contest will signal whether Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis have path forward in 2024 race
By John McCormick, Alex Leary and Eliza Collins The Wall Street Journal Updated Jan. 15, 2024 11:15 pm ET
WEST DES MOINES, Iowa—Donald Trump won the Iowa caucuses Monday night with the largest margin in the history of the first Republican presidential nominating contest, cementing an early victory in his defiant bid to return to the White House.
The Associated Press declared Trump the winner roughly a half hour after the caucuses convened. The call came so quickly that at some caucus locations, attendees had not even finished making speeches of support for the various candidates.
With 87% of the vote reported, the AP said Trump had 51%. He was followed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis at 21%, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley at 19% and biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy at 8%. Turnout was well below levels recorded in 2016, when the state last held competitive GOP caucuses.
Trump’s dominance carries him to New Hampshire, where he is expected to face a stronger challenge in a Jan. 23 primary that will include more independent voters. The outcome also underscores the resilience he has shown despite a barrage of criminal prosecutions that could still upend his trajectory toward a rematch with President Biden.
“We want to thank the great people of Iowa,” Trump said during a victory celebration in Des Moines. “I really think this is time now for everybody, our country to come together.”
The tight battle between Haley and DeSantis for second place left unclear who would claim the runner-up position, fueling that candidate’s quest to become the only Trump alternative as a long-shot challenger to the front-runner.
The results, on a night that saw the coldest temperatures on record for the caucuses, gave the first tangible indication that the party remains overwhelmingly committed to restoring Trump’s power, instead of turning the page on the man who remade the GOP in his image when he won in 2016. Analysts are closely watching whether Trump gets a majority of the vote as a metric of his fortitude in the party.
The DeSantis campaign complained after news outlets quickly declared Trump the winner.
“It is absolutely outrageous that the media would participate in election interference by calling the race before tens of thousands of Iowans even had a chance to vote,” DeSantis spokesman Andrew Romeo said in a statement. “The media is in the tank for Trump and this is the most egregious example yet.”
A second-place finish for DeSantis—who centered his bid in the state with visits to all 99 Iowa counties—could salvage his ability to tell donors and supporters that he has a path forward.
A third-place finish for Haley, a former United Nations ambassador, would force her to expend resources battling DeSantis, when she was instead hoping to capitalize on a strong position for the next nominating contest in New Hampshire, where the electorate is more centrist and has a history of bucking Iowa.
ELECTION 2024
Presidential, Senate and House Election Forecasts DeSantis promised to appear Tuesday in South Carolina, another key early primary state, and he had scheduled events later that day in New Hampshire. Trump and Haley both had rallies planned Tuesday in New Hampshire.
A clear path to the GOP nomination for Trump would set the stage for a 2024 contest few voters seem to want: a rematch between Trump and Biden. Both men suffer from poor general-election poll ratings, and many voters have said they are eager for alternatives.
The candidates challenging the former president had hoped to find enough dissatisfaction with him to build their own voter coalitions. Haley had shown signs in polling of consolidating college-educated Republicans, such as those in the suburbs or college towns of Iowa, as well as voters less committed to conservative causes. DeSantis had moved aggressively to win voters who fear a liberal takeover of schools, businesses and academia.
But Trump romped among all those groups, according to preliminary results from AP VoteCast, a survey of people who said they would participate in the caucuses. He carried 35% of college graduates to Haley’s 31%, while dominating among those without a four-year college degree. He beat Haley 44% to 31% among self-identified moderates. And he won the largest share of voters who said they lived in urban or suburban communities.
The caucuses punctuated a yearlong battle to wrest the party away from Trump, one that consumed tens of millions of dollars in advertising and other campaign expenditures and transfixed voters on both sides of the aisle. More than a dozen challengers at one point competed for the Republican nomination.
The former president looked beatable when he announced his candidacy shortly after the 2022 midterm elections, when he was blamed for party losses after endorsing candidates in some key races. As calls grew for him to step aside, attention focused on DeSantis, who won re-election as governor in a landslide.
But Trump’s supporters remained steadfast, and his candidacy grew stronger amid a cascade of criminal prosecutions. He faces 91 criminal charges for matters including his handling of classified documents and efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election. He cast himself as a victim of political persecution and government overreach, positions top rivals largely endorsed.
That helped win over voters like Kellie Doty, a stay at home mother, 56, who backed Trump at a caucus in Urbandale. Doty liked DeSantis and felt he was the future of the Republican Party, but said that “because of the persecution of Trump and everything he’s gone through,” she needed to back him this time around. Her caucus hadn’t even started by the time the race was called for Trump.
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The contest saw established Republicans—such as former Vice President Mike Pence and Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina—flame out and vaulted Ramaswamy momentarily into the spotlight. Through it all, Trump refused to play by traditional rules, eschewing debates and spending little time on the ground in Iowa. He continually ratcheted up incendiary rhetoric.
Mark Imm, Rachael Imm, Julie Kuhlers and Kraig Kuhlers talk while they and others participate in a caucus at Walnut Hills Elementary School in Urbandale, Iowa. Ballots are counted after the caucus. KC MCGINNIS FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL (2) A Trump victory in line with early results would surpass the 12.8 percentage point margin Sen. Bob Dole scored over his nearest rival in 1988, setting a record for a competitive year. Trump hopes to secure the delegates needed for the Republican nomination by March.
“I looked at all of them and I came to the conclusion that Trump is the man that can lead our country into the next generation for my grandkids,” Marcia Cooper, 69, a retired nurse from suburban Des Moines, said Monday afternoon.
Unlike in 2016, when Trump had little organization in Iowa and ended up placing second to Sen. Ted Cruz, his campaign this time emphasized generating turnout by training volunteers and targeting supporters who hadn’t caucused before.
Trump also prevented DeSantis from consolidating support from the state’s influential evangelicals, who represented about two-thirds of the 2016 GOP caucuses electorate. In recent days, he warned against complacency, telling crowds to ignore polls showing him with a huge lead.
Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy greets supporters during a campaign event in Urbandale, Iowa, on Monday. PHOTO: KEVIN DIETSCH/GETTY IMAGES Snow and cold in the closing days of the campaign caused candidates to limit or cancel some final-weekend efforts to win over voters, with some events moving online. Temperatures dipped below zero, with wind chills in the double digits below, when people headed to precinct meetings.
Road conditions, following two major snow storms in the past week, were improving in urban and suburban areas where Haley was expected to find her strongest support. But in rural areas, where Trump and DeSantis were likely to find theirs, there were still travel challenges.
The Iowa GOP said they expected total turnout to be around 100,000, well below the roughly 186,000 who participated in 2016, when the GOP last held competitive caucuses.
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The only contest of consequence in Iowa was on the Republican side, after the Democratic National Committee demoted the state in favor of South Carolina going first on its nomination calendar. Iowa Democrats, who met Monday night to conduct party business, have started to vote by mail for their nomination preferences. Those results won’t be announced until March.
The Iowa Republican electorate hasn’t been a natural fit for Haley, who is viewed as more moderate than Trump or DeSantis. One reason her prospects look better in New Hampshire is that large numbers of independents typically vote in that state’s GOP primary, widening her base of support. Some Democrats in Iowa said they planned to caucus for her, viewing her as the strongest candidate to block Trump from winning the nomination.
Marcia Cooper of Johnston, Iowa, and others await an appearance by Donald Trump, Jr. in Ankeny, Iowa, on Monday PHOTO: KC MCGINNIS FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL Crossover Democrats could also be a factor in New Hampshire’s primary, particularly because the Democratic contest isn’t sanctioned by the national party after South Carolina was given the leadoff spot on the party’s calendar. That could motivate some New Hampshire Democrats to register as independents, so they can vote for Haley in an effort to weaken Trump.
Rachael Imm, 53, who works with animals, also attended the caucus in Urbandale and backed Haley because she felt she was the most moderate candidate. But Imm wasn’t optimistic Haley would be able to defeat Trump.
“I don’t know why they think he can win because he didn’t,” she said, referring to his prospects in the general election. “The last time we had a head-to-head between him and Biden he didn’t win,” she said. She said she would likely vote for Biden if it was a Trump-Biden rematch.
Aaron Zitner and Jack Gillum contributed to this article.
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