By Manzanita Miller
With the Iowa Republican caucuses less than two weeks away, all eyes are on the first in the nation contest that will set the tone for the 2024 presidential election. Iowans caucus on Monday, January 15th, in the first GOP primary contest of the year, and New Hampshire quickly follows on January 23rd. Â Â
Iowans have a strong affinity for Former President Trump, with 538’s average of Iowa polls showing Trump leading his closest competitor by 32 percentage points. Trump earns 50% of the vote, followed by Gov. Ron DeSantis with 18%, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley with 16% and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy with 6%. However, with DeSantis and Haley so close, those numbers could flip by election day. Â Â Â Â Â
Based on a comprehensive poll of GOP primary voters, even among Iowa Republicans who are on the fence or do not plan to support Trump, Iowans want a candidate who is similar to Trump and who holds the same values. A December CBS News YouGov poll of over 1,000 voters found 70% of Iowa GOP primary voters say if the GOP nominee is not Trump, they want the nominee to be similar to Trump. Â
A full 89% of GOP primary voters say they would like the nominee’s policies to align with Trump’s, even if a different individual were nominated. Evangelicals feel particularly strongly on this, with 92% saying they would like the GOP nominee to share Trump’s policy views.   Â
This holds with how Iowa voters view Trump’s challengers, with the largest share of voters (49%) saying Ron DeSantis, who is in second place, is the most similar to Trump policy-wise. Voters say Ramaswamy is the second most similar to Trump (27%), and just 16% say Nikki Haley’s views are similar to Trump.  Â
However, Iowa voters are somewhat split on whether they stand behind a Trump-like personality, with only 44% of voters saying if the GOP nominee were not Trump, that person should share Trump’s personality. Fifty-six percent of voters would like a GOP nominee with a personality type different from Trump.
Some Iowa voters are also concerned about the way Trump interacts with his political rivals. Just under half of Iowa voters (48%) say if the GOP nominee were not Trump, that individual should speak about political opponents in the same manner as Trump, while 52% say the GOP nominee should not speak about rivals like Trump does. Â Â Â
On individual policy issues such as deporting illegal immigrants, there is broad support for Trump’s political views. Eighty-five percent of Iowa GOP voters would support the GOP nominee deporting undocumented immigrants, and 77% would support the GOP nominee investigating government officials they suspect of political bias. Iowans also strongly support banning medical procedures that change a child’s gender (91%) and banning discussions about sexual orientation in public schools (86%) according to the poll.
A significant number of Iowa voters who say they are considering supporting Trump in the caucuses have not always been Trump supporters. Of those considering Trump, 26% say they were not always Trump supporters, and a full 39% of independents considering Trump say they haven’t always been supporters. A quarter of younger voters under age 45 and 27% of Evangelicals say they have not always been Trump supporters but are considering him now.   Â
The results of the Iowa caucuses will set the stage for the rest of the GOP contests and could shrink the field of challenger candidates if they are unable to draw enough support. However, Iowa Republicans appear particularly loyal to Former President Trump, and even among those who are considering other options, Iowans largely support Trump’s policy views and platform. Â
Manzanita Miller is an associate analyst at Americans for Limited Government Foundation.