Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ campaign is making a high-risk bet that it can halt Donald Trump’s march to the Republican presidential nomination by winning the critical state of Iowa next January. A loss in the first caucus contest would be a near-fatal blow to the former president’s hopes for regaining the White House and could leave a crowded G.O.P. field struggling to find a clear challenger. That is why the campaign is focusing so much attention on the state, according to G.O.P. strategists close to the campaign and grassroots Republicans in Iowa.
Aides said the campaign has a team in Iowa working on a strategy for the state, including setting up an office and hiring staff. The advisers are focused on winning over evangelical and conservative voters, especially women, whom they see as a critical target. They are working to ensure the governor’s message — which focuses on conservative social issues such as abortion and education — is heard by the right-leaning crowds in Iowa.
DeSantis and his advisers are sticking to a long-haul, Iowa-first strategy even though he trails Trump by nearly 30 percentage points in national polls. The campaign is betting that a surprise win in Iowa will give it momentum and a boost when it enters other states. DeSantis’ team is also trying to prevent the state’s G.O.P. establishment from splintering to support a different candidate.
With the race for the Republican nomination still seven months away, DeSantis’ campaign is also making a bet that his outsider status will give him more traction than his rivals. The campaign believes that many Republican contenders have ties to establishment figures and that voters will want to give a fresh face a chance, a person familiar with the planning said.
However, the campaign’s strategists are also preparing for a possible setback in Iowa. The strategists acknowledge that the state’s typical voters are skeptical of outsiders and have been turned off by DeSantis’s “kitchen sink” attacks and inexperience. They are betting he can use his background as a Navy judge advocate and his popularity in Florida to overcome those obstacles.
The DeSantis campaign has criticized Trump’s recent slams on Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, a fellow Republican, saying her landslide re-election last year shows that she earned the support of Iowans. She and other state leaders, including U.S. Sens. Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst, have refused to endorse any candidate and say they will help all the potential candidates. The governor’s advisers hope a contested race among Republicans will benefit him by forcing the former president to fight harder for every vote. They are betting that a contested race will force more Republican voters to pay attention to his message and see him as a strong candidate against Democrat Joe Biden in November. A new Des Moines Register/Mediacom Iowa poll released last week showed that 48% of self-described Republicans want Trump as their nominee, but his lead has eroded.