I’m a big Ron DeSantis fan, but whoever he’s got advising his campaign has done him a huge disservice by focusing on Iowa. Even if he wins tomorrow, it means nothing. Iowa doesn’t pick winners. Iowa does not matter.
Quick: Which Republicans won Iowa in the last 3 Iowa Caucuses? If you said Ted Cruz, Rick Santorum, and Mike Huckabee, you need to get out of the house more often. You’d also be right. Remember any of their administrations? Hell, remember any of their general election campaigns?
The last time Iowa produced a nominee for Republicans was 2000 with George W. Bush, who came in just ahead of Steve Forbes and Alan Keys, so you can see the Iowa GOP has its finger on the pulse of...something that decidedly is not the party.
Iowa voters might matter more if they weren’t followed up by states that don’t really like massive government subsidies for things like ethanol. But it isn’t. Iowa happens, politicians pledge fealty to corn growers and promise to keep the gravy train flowing, then head to New Hampshire where, even though the number of conservatives there is shrinking, they still have the motto, “Live Free or Die.”
The state last voted for a Republican in the general election in 2000, so they’ve really leaned heavily on the “Die” side of the scale for a while. But the Republican voters still want to live free, so pledging to give away the store to people in another state a few days before they vote is not easily forgotten. Nor should it be.
Donald Trump bucked that trend…sort of.
People forget, but in 2016, Donald Trump promised Iowa farmers he’d keep the subsidy express running, and then he did poorly in New Hampshire. Granted, he won, but only with 35 percent of the vote. In a three-person field, there’s no way he would have won.
Trump’s problem was he wanted to win everywhere, either for a show of strength or ego; it doesn’t really matter. So he tried to be all things to all people, saying whatever people in each state wanted to hear. It was the same in the general election, where he lucked into having as an opponent possibly the least-liked person in American political history, Hillary Clinton. He still lost the popular vote by a lot, but he won the presidency, which is all that matters.
To get there and get the nomination in 2016, Trump had to win pluralities in a state so different from Iowa to be unrecognizable as the same country. How much do you think South Carolina, Massachusetts, or Nevada have in common with Iowa from an economic standpoint?
Trump played the long game in 2016 and won. He didn’t win in a walk or get above 50 percent in any primary in any state until late April. He won because a huge field split the vote so that he could win with 33 percent.
It was a useful lesson for anyone interested – that you can win the whole thing by never winning a majority. Still, the major lesson is losing Iowa is not only not devastating, it’s a good omen.
The 2024 race is different; the field is much smaller, so the odds of winning anywhere with a third of the vote are unlikely. But the idea of riding a victory in Iowa to anywhere but the clearance rack is still a crazy idea.
Whoever wins in Iowa is not guaranteed the nomination, though they’ll inevitably claim it does. The trick to having a shot at the Republican nomination is to survive Iowa without embarrassing yourself but not spinning yourself silly to the point that you win it. Then, build on that performance in New Hampshire and South Carolina.
If you survive them, it’s anyone’s ballgame. But you never want to win Iowa; you never want to start off a race with nowhere to go but down.
I don’t know what will happen tomorrow, but I do know that nothing that happens tomorrow settles anything. While this might not be a marathon like 2016 was, it won’t be a 100-meter dash either. It won’t be a coronation for anyone, which is a very good thing. Because at the end of it waits Democrats, people who will literally do anything in order to win. A little trial by fire is a good thing before descending into the pits of hell to take on the real enemy.
Derek Hunter is the host of a free daily podcast (subscribe!) and author of the book Outrage, INC., which exposes how liberals use fear and hatred to manipulate the masses, and host of the weekly “Week in F*cking Review” podcast where the news is spoken about the way it deserves to be. Follow him on Twitter at @DerekAHunter.