On January 15, 2024, the Republican caucuses in Iowa kicked off as the nation held its first presidential nominating contest for the 2024 election. This race means a lot for Republicans because this is the race that officially selects the Republican candidate for the Republican party.
With only one hour to vote for the Republican nominee in Iowa, over 110,000 people cast their vote which equated to only 15% of the Republican voters in Iowa. This voter turnout was much lower than what people were anticipating and many analysts said that the low turnout for voters was due to the extremely cold weather in Iowa during the voting.
This race was very intense with four main participants battling for the Republican nomination. These included former President Donald Trump, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Former UN ambassador Nikki Haley, and American entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy.
During the race, popular candidate Ramaswamy surprisingly dropped out of the race before it ended. After his announcement, he quickly endorsed former President Trump. The total race lasted a few hours until all the votes were counted. “I feel like some people may have been heavily misinformed and chose to vote for a candidate that didn’t align with their values,” said Birmingham student Abby Serrano (12).
After the race ended and votes concluded, Donald Trump won 51% of the vote, Ron DeSantis won 21% of the vote, Nikki Haley won 19% and Vivek Ramaswamy won 7% of the vote. This meant that over 50% of the people who voted in the caucuses chose to support Trump. It seems very evident that people’s views of Trump have not changed with all the hearings and legal proceedings against him. “I am very anxious about the elections this year and what peoples’ reaction may be” stated Birmingham student Chloe Stansfield (12).
Because of this, many people are also predicting that for this year’s elections, Trump’s unwavering supporters will most likely get him to or very close to the presidency. The recent results of the caucuses have scared the sitting democratic president and vice president. Vice President Kamala Harris is very confident about winning their re-election bid for 2024. This has many Democrats worried that she may be too confident to win again. Many analysts are also predicting that a Trump vs. Biden rematch is likely to happen.
