The race begins for real.
Republican presidential candidate Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks during a roundtable discussion, Thursday, Dec. 28, 2023, in Ankeny, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
With the Iowa Caucuses now just 12 days away prospects appear to be improving for former president Donald Trump even as they appear to diminish for Florida governor Ron DeSantis.
In Iowa, which holds its unique caucus format on January 15, polls show Trump with a commanding lead. According to the Real Clear Politics average of polls, Donald Trump leads the Republican field in Iowa at 51.3 percent with Ron DeSantis coming in at a very distant 18.6 percent.
DeSantis has staked his entire campaign on Iowa. He has the largest organization in the state of any of the Republican candidates and he is the only one in the field who has visited all 99 Iowa counties.
In an interview yesterday on KCCI, the CBS television affiliate in Des Moines, he was asked how he continues to have confidence in his strategy given his apparent distant second place standing in the polls.
Well, the polls haven’t predicted the winner, I don’t think ever in terms of being accurate. It’s just a different beast when you’re talking about a caucus versus calling people on the phone who may or may not show up. So, we don’t really view that as something that’s indicative. We view it as we know we need to get a certain number of people committed. We need to turn out those people. Of course, what the total turnout will be is not clearly known, but if we get our chunk of that and then the people that will make decisions and in the days leading, we capture that, we’re going to be in great shape. And so that’s how we viewed it from the beginning.”
As to front runner Donald Trump, much of his campaign continues to take place on the legal front. On December 29, Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows announced that she was barring Donald Trump from that state’s primary ballot. Following the lead of the Colorado Supreme Court, which issued a ruling to remove Trump from that state’s ballot on December 19, Ms. Bellows cites Trump’s ineligibility under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which is generally known as the “insurrection clause.”
Former advisor to President Barack Obama David Axelrod expressed his concerns about this strategy in an appearance with Brianna Keller on CNN this past Sunday.
You know, he’s only gained since he started getting indicted. You know, what you thought might be kryptonite for him has turned out to be battery packs. And this is a big one for him. Presumably the Supreme Court will deal with it fairly quickly. And I expect that they will leave him on the ballot. And yes, Brianna, I have very, very strong reservations about all of this. I do think it would rip the country apart if he were actually prevented from running because tens of millions of people want to vote for him. I think if you’re going to beat Donald Trump, you’re going to probably have to do it at the polls.”
That process begins for real in just 12 days.
