Iowa: It all comes down to turnout.
January 17, 2024
I gave my initial thoughts on the Iowa caucuses in yesterday’s newsletter. My thesis has held up well over the last twenty-four hours—that the victory achieved by Trump contains some troubling signs for his campaign outside of Iowa. There has been a lot of good analysis on the day after the caucuses that makes this story worth discussing for a second day.
Why?
Because for all its flaws, the Iowa Republican caucus was an actual election where voters were forced to make a choice. That fact provides better insight into what people are thinking than a squadron of pollsters flying 60,000 feet over the political terrain. Of course, there were significant limitations on the results, which is part of the story, as well.
But before we deconstruct the election, let’s take a moment to talk about the good people of Iowa.
Don’t assume everyone in Iowa is a MAGA extremist.
It is challenging to talk about Monday’s results in Iowa without acknowledging that among those who attended the caucuses, most voters hold extremist views. Those views are reprehensible and deserve to be condemned. But those who showed up on Monday were mostly Trump loyalists who represent the slimmest majority possible of voters in Iowa.
I struggled last night to craft my analysis in a way that did not paint with an overly broad brush in describing Iowa voters. (I limited my descriptions to percentages of “caucusgoers”.) Not all commentators have been as careful, and frankly, I could have been more precise in my descriptions.
So, as we collectively talk about the results in Iowa, it is important to realize that 49% of those who voted on a bitterly cold night (-3 Fahrenheit) did not support Trump. Most of the voters who opposed Trump do not condone his views about immigrants poisoning the blood of America, or his opponents being “vermin,” or his belief that the 2020 election was “rigged.”
In November 2024, we will need the majority of Iowans to join us in common cause in opposing Trump. The good news from Monday’s caucuses is that such a result appears possible. Iowans who oppose Trump are our allies and friends.
As we move forward in the 2024 campaign, let’s remember that there are Democrats, Independents, and Republicans in Iowa who will not support Trump. Our job is to convince them to show up for Biden. Lumping them in with MAGA extremists is not an effective way of achieving that goal.
And the same applies to every so-called “red state.” In every state, there are local and statewide offices that can be flipped—something that will help limit and blunt the effect of Republican control of statehouses and governors’ mansions.
So, let’s set aside the notion that red states are a lost cause and do not deserve our attention or support. Not only do they deserve our help, but they are the front line of resistance—just like the Democrats, Independents, and Republicans who chose not to vote for Trump on Monday.
Trump's hollow victory in Iowa portends trouble.
By Tuesday morning, most media outlets were backing off their initial proclamations of a triumph for Trump and were recognizing that Trump's 51% showing in Iowa was weak. See, for example,
Let’s Face It: Trump’s Iowa Result Was Pretty Weak | (Talking Points Memo)
No, Trump Did Not 'Conquer Iowa.' How the Media Botched Election Coverage—Again | (Newsweek)
The best summary of Trump's pyrrhic victory was by Lucian Truscott IV on Substack, How Joe Biden won the Iowa Republican caucus. Truscott drills down on the statistics that demonstrate Trump's narrow win in a state where he should have won 80% of the Republican vote is a sign of trouble. Truscott summarizes the outcome for Biden as follows:
[Trump's loss] tells me that the man who supposedly controls the entire Republican Party may have a stranglehold on Republicans in the House of Representatives, he may control the estimated 25 percent of Republicans who describe themselves as MAGA, but when it gets down to voters in one of the states every political pundit sees as favorable to him, Donald Trump could not convince nearly 50 percent of them to vote for him.
I’m telling you: they must have been jumping up and down in the halls of the White House last night when the Iowa results came in.
How many people turned out to vote in Iowa?
In assessing the significance of Trump's victory, a relevant factor is what percentage of voters turned out to vote. Before minimizing Trump's victory, we must recognize (in the words of Josh Marshall), “A win is a win.” If Trump had lost, we would be having an entirely different conversation tonight.
Turnout was low—but it is always low in Iowa primary caucuses. Even in “high turnout” years, only about 30% of Republicans show up to the caucus. On Monday of this week, only 110,298 voters participated in the GOP caucuses, about 19% of the 594,533 “active” registered Republicans (according to the Iowa Secretary of State).
But some of the voters who showed up were independents (or Democrats who switched registration for the caucuses), so the real turnout was more like 15% of Republicans on Monday (according to the NYTimes).
And only 51% of those who showed up voted for Trump (or 52,260). Thus, Trump's victory in Iowa was achieved with support from 7% of Iowa Republicans—or 3% of Iowa’s 1,518,280 active voters.
That figure should shock you. Trump's victory on Monday night was decided by the 97% of Iowa voters who “did not vote” in the caucuses. So, before we overinterpret the result on Monday, we must recognize that the potential for a devastating defeat for Trump is within our reach—assuming that we can motivate sufficient turnout.
So, as we face the onslaught of polls in the coming primary season predicting doom for Democrats, we must always remember that turnout can beat any poll. Speaking of polls, how did they fare in predicting the result in Iowa? Read on!
Did the pollsters get it right in Iowa?
Did the pollsters correctly “predict” the outcome in Iowa? That’s not clear, but they are taking a victory lap even if they didn’t. Before going further, it bears repeating that good polls describe ranges of current support, even though they are almost always (wrongly) described by the media as predicting a particular outcome.
Christian Paz of Vox suggests that the pollsters “got it right” in Iowa and should be trusted in the future. See Christian Paz, Vox, After Iowa, is it time to trust the polls again?
Paz writes,
Donald Trump’s resounding victory in the 2024 Iowa caucuses should have been expected by just about everyone. You could have seen it coming based on his fundraising numbers, his campaign’s presence in the state, his refusal to debate his primary opponents — or you could have looked at just about any poll.
Concluding that Trump would be the likely winner was the easy part. The question is, did the polls accurately describe the range of support for Trump? The answer is yes—with emphasis on “the range” of support. Read Paz’s analysis for details, but he analyzes one firm’s polling and compares it to the actual outcome. Paz writes,
The final results? Trump at 51 percent, DeSantis at 21 percent, and Haley at 19 — a mean average error of 3 points.
So, for pollsters, a “mean average error” of 3 points is “getting it right”—but in a two-person race in a closely divided electorate, a 3-point “mean average error” could be the difference between defeat and victory.
Paz analyzed one polling firm’s data that “missed” DeSantis’s actual results by 5 points. The pollster explained that “miss” as follows:
“The modest surprise was DeSantis, who beat his polling average by 5 points,” Morris said. “That speaks to his edge on enthusiasm. He had a higher percentage of voters who really wanted to turn out and vote for him than Nikki Haley.”
So, in other words, if a pollster “gets it wrong” by 5 points but can come up with an explanation for the error, the pollster claims they “got it right.”
Most importantly, the pollster explains the “miss” in predicting DeSantis’s support by attributing the error to turnout driven by enthusiasm!
Turnout can always overwhelm expected support, especially when the “Did Not Vote” population is similar in size to the total vote garnered by the winner. Remember that time that Joe Biden won the presidency with 81 million votes—and 77 million eligible voters did not vote? See Voting and Registration in the Election of November 2020 (census.gov) Table 1.
The results in Iowa affirm a fundamental truth: It all comes down to turnout. Hold fast to that truth over the next ten months.
Shopping bags and popcorn cartons: Voting in a GOP Iowa caucus.
Many Republicans demand strict security over the voting process to prevent fraud—and to prevent the “wrong sort of people” from voting. In many states, restrictive voter ID requirements prevent eligible voters from voting. After votes are cast, strict audit trails and computer security accompany every step of the process.
Not so in the Iowa caucuses, where voters scribble the candidate’s name on slips of paper, which are then placed in a grocery bag or popcorn carton that is passed among voters like a collection plate at a church service. A video of that casual process is described by Ellie Mystal on Twitter as, “What voting looks like when white people know only white people will be allowed to cast ballots.”
View the video by clicking here: Ellie Mystal | Twitter
Budget negotiations make progress.
Sigh. I should just create a standard insert describing the budget process in Congress that can be pasted into each newsletter. Negotiators in the Senate have made progress in passing two continuing resolutions that will kick the can down the road for a month and a half. See The Hill, Senate advances bill to prevent shutdown this week past first hurdle.
But—and let’s all say this together—prospects for passage in the House are uncertain.
In a surprise development, bipartisan support has emerged for increasing the Child Tax Credit from $1,600 to $2,000 over three years. In addition, the method for calculating the credit in multi-child families will increase the likelihood of claiming the full credit. See The Hill, Could child tax credit be expanded in 2024?
To be clear, these enhancements will not recover the full Child Tax Credit available under Biden’s American Rescue Plan—but it is an improvement nonetheless. The Child Tax Credit is one of the most effective ways to help lift children out of poverty.
Jessica Craven at Chop Wood Carry Water is urging readers to join a Resistbot letter-writing campaign to urge members of Congress to pass the enhancements to the Child Tax Credit. See Chop Wood, Carry Water 1/16 - by Jessica Craven and scroll down to “Resistbot Letter.”
Meanwhile, in the defense secrets case against Donald Trump.
It has been a while since I have mentioned the criminal prosecution of Trump for unlawful retention of national defense documents. That is, in part, because Judge Aileen Cannon has been slow-walking the prosecution to ensure that Trump's trial won’t occur until after the 2024 election. Dennis Aftergut and Laurence Tribe have published an essay in Slate explaining the latest developments: Judge Aileen Cannon is sabotaging the Trump classifed docs case.
The article will bring you up to speed on recent developments, but here’s the gist: Judge Cannon is denying routine motions designed to prepare the case for trial. As explained by Aftergut and Tribe,
Cannon’s new ruling rejected special counsel Jack Smith’s entirely standard request that she order Trump to state whether he intends to rely on an “advice of counsel” defense ahead of the trial, currently scheduled for May 20. Advance notice of the defense helps expedite a trial because defendants asserting it need to provide additional discovery to prosecutors . . . .
Judge Cannon seems to be intent on delaying the trial in hopes that Trump will be elected and appoint her to the Supreme Court.
Aftergut and Tribe are too polite to say it, so I will: Judge Cannon is a disgrace and embarrassment to the federal judiciary. In a just world, she would be impeached for engaging in blatantly partisan conduct designed to protect a man credibly accused of compromising US defense secrets.
Concluding Thoughts.
I have devoted the better part of two newsletters explaining why Trump's win in Iowa is not a portent of disaster. But, as Josh Marshall wrote, “A win is a win,” and the win in Iowa likely means that Trump will clear the GOP field of challengers before Super Tuesday (March 5, 2024).
Trump will be Biden’s opponent. All efforts should be focused on registration and turnout.
The historically low turnout in Iowa can be viewed in several ways.
First, it was -3 Fahrenheit, a dangerously low temperature. Rational people could have reasonably concluded that they should stay home to protect their safety and health.
Second, people could have believed that Trump was going to win by a large margin and concluded that their vote didn’t matter.
Third, Republicans may have been expressing their dissatisfaction with Trump and the other candidates by staying home.
Finally, people may not have cared enough about the state of our democracy to vote.
As noted above, 97% of Iowa’s active registered voters did not go to the caucuses. Voters likely stayed home for “all of the above” reasons, so identifying a single explanation for the low turnout is not possible.
While low turnout should worry us all, it is a problem that is eminently solvable—and we are the answer. If each of us sets a goal of convincing one person to vote who would not otherwise do so, Joe Biden would win by 20 million votes.
Convincing one person to vote is not easy, but neither is it impossible. Set that as a personal goal. Start now and give yourself nine months to convince someone to “get out to vote.” Our democracy may depend on personal actions taken by concerned citizens in the next few months. Be part of the solution!
Talk to you tomorrow!
Tom Keen won seat in the Florida House District 35 Special Election!
I appreciate your reminder not to make the assumption that all people in Iowa or other “red states “ are MAGA diehards. For instance, there is a very active organization in Texas called Mothers Against Greg Abbot .org who, along with many others, are fighting back. Let’s find out who these groups are and help them out. We need to build coalitions everywhere.