Most Iowa Caucus Voters Think Trump Won in 2020

51%

A majority of voters likely to attend the Iowa Republican caucuses believe that Donald Trump won the 2020 presidential election over Joe Biden, a new Des Moines Register/NBC News/Mediacom Iowa Poll shows. Asked whether “you believe or not believe Donald Trump’s claims he won the 2020 presidential election,” 51% of likely Republican caucusgoers say they believe them, 41% do not and 8% are unsure.

O’Rourke: Dems Should be Alarmed by Iowa Turnout

“Perhaps the most alarming thing that came out of Iowa this week was not the incompetence of the party and the failed technology that leaves us still in the dark as to the final results of the caucus… what should most concern us is that turnout might have barely kept pace with 2016 levels, and fell well below the historic turnout of 2008. We’re in the middle of a national emergency, and people are staying home.”

Beto O’Rourke

The S.O.B from South Bend

“Maybe it’s his calculated manner, or the way he waves at a crowd like an animatronic member of the British royal family, or his Midwestern aw-shucks niceness. But more than a year into his presidential campaign, despite all the attention paid to his candidacy, people still miss how aggressive Buttigieg is. … That’s what the victory-without-a-victory speech he gave last night was about.”

The Atlantic

Iowa Has Probably Screwed Up the Primaries, at Least for a While

“Maybe there will eventually be a decent-sized Iowa bounce despite all of this. But there’s a good chance that the candidates who did well in Iowa get screwed, and the candidates who did poorly there get a mulligan. To repeat: There’s very little importance in a mathematical sense to who wins 41 delegates. Iowa is all about the media narrative it produces and all about momentum, and that momentum, whoever wins, is likely to have been blunted.”

Nate Silver

The Iowa Caucases Are Dead

“This fiasco means the end of the caucuses as a significant American political event. The rest of the country was already losing patience with Iowa anyway and this cooks Iowa’s goose. Frankly, it should, The real winner tonight was Donald Trump, who got to watch his opponents wallow in a mess. A lot of good Democratic candidates and people who fought their hearts out here for … nothing.”

— David Yepsen quoted by Politico

Iowa to be a Nail-Biter

19%

A new Focus on Rural America poll in Iowa finds Pete Buttigieg leading the Democratic presidential race with 19%, followed by Bernie Sanders at 17%, Elizabeth Warren at 15%, Joe Biden at 15% and Amy Klobuchar at 11%. “Our biggest takeaway… The top four candidates are in a virtual dead heat, and Klobuchar isn’t that far off. That means precinct by precinct delegate counts and realignments are going to make this a nail-biter to the very end.”