Iowa’s first-in-the-nation caucuses will be held next January 15.  All Americans who follow political events will be glued to their screens.  The candidates who take first in their respective contests will be well situated for other states’ subsequent ones. 

What happens in Iowa, then, affects national electoral fortunes. 

As president, Donald Trump resisted calls to move Iowa to a later spot on the schedule and preserved its historic, influential status.  Being a lifelong Hawkeye State resident, I took particular notice and appreciated Trump’s resoluteness on Iowa’s behalf.  So did scores of my fellow state citizens.  

I was painfully aware when, in early November, Iowa governor Kim Reynolds betrayed Trump by publicly endorsing his feeble competitor, Florida governor Ron DeSantis. 

(I write of betrayal because Trump had endorsed Reynolds’s gubernatorial bid.  He says she sought his backing.  And this is how she repays him.)

In years preceding her disloyalty to Trump, Reynolds did some fine things.  In 2018, she signed a fetal heartbeat bill.  In March of 2019, she endorsed a bill requiring universities to protect free speech.  And owing to her appointments, our state’s Supreme Court shifted to sensible conservative status.

But the Iowa chief executive’s betrayal of Trump and embrace of DeSantis has larger implications than its immediate circumstances.  Her foolish decision can be interpreted as indifference toward regular Iowans, a majority of whom support the former president.

An October NBC News/Des Moines Register/Mediacom survey of likely Iowa GOP caucus attendees found Trump enjoying 43% support.  DeSantis and South Carolina governor Nikki Haley tied for second place, each at 16%. 

Regular Iowans march proudly in the MAGA movement, Reynolds’s backstabbing being of no consequence to us.

Following Reynolds’s strikingly unwise endorsement of DeSantis, Trump posted a characteristically devastating assessment on Truth Social: “Two extremely disloyal people is, however, a beautiful thing to watch. They can now remain loyal to each other because nobody wants them!!!”

“My life was a lot better when Trump was in office,” one Bettendorf, Iowa respondent told NBC earlier this year.  “I felt safe; things were cheaper; he helped out the farmers and my parents.  Things were better — plain and simple.”

A November poll by the Trafalgar Group found basically the same results.  It asked 1,084 Iowa GOP “likely voters” whom they would support were the election held now. 

Again, Trump won the backing of 43%.  DeSantis trailed far behind with 17.5%.

Enthusiasm for another Trump term has been shown nationally as well.  A November New York Times poll showed Trump outperforming President Biden in five of the six crucial swing states. 

The 45th president’s vows to re-energize the economy, halt illegal immigration, and restore America’s pre-eminence in the world enjoy broad voter approval, particularly given the terrible Biden years.

I would speculate that once the former president has won the Iowa caucus and pocketed the national Republican nomination, Kim Reynolds may hasten to get a late ticket on the victory-bound Trump Train.

But as far as her future in politics, Trump is probably right.  Iowa voters have long memories.

Waterloo writer DC Larson is the author of Ideas Afoot (Bromley Street Books).  He counts among freelance credits Daily Caller, American Thinker, and Western Journal.

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.