A former GOP strategist predicted that Donald Trump will effectively win the 2024 Republican presidential nomination outright by securing one key early victory.
The former president is currently the leading candidate for the nomination by a wide margin as he attempts to retake the White House after his loss to Joe Biden in 2020. Recent primary polls have regularly given Trump over 50 percent support from voters. His nearest competitors trail his numbers significantly, with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis being the only other candidate with double-digit support, and former Vice President Mike Pence polling in the high single digits.
Given this overwhelming support from the GOP base, former Republican National Committee (RNC) official Douglas Heye predicted on Sunday that Trump could effectively win the nomination early. Speaking with CNN‘s Jake Tapper on State of the Union, Heye said that if Trump wins the Iowa caucuses in January, “the field is over.”
“If Donald Trump wins Iowa this time, the field is over,” he explained. “So, all things are going to come down to Iowa in this case. If Ron DeSantis wins, if Mike Pence can 99-county his way in a victory, then we have a wide-open race. But if Donald Trump wins Iowa in January—and it is six months and one week to go so there is a long time—this race, I think is effectively over.”
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The Iowa caucuses have long been the first statewide contest for presidential primary races. While Democrats recently approved a measure to move the South Carolina primary to the front of the line starting next year, it remains the first contest for Republicans.
While a win in Iowa is typically seen as a solid indicator of who will eventually secure their party’s nomination, that has not been the case in recent cycles. As noted by Heye on Sunday, Trump narrowly lost the 2016 Iowa caucuses to Texas Senator Ted Cruz, building up momentum in later races. President Joe Biden also suffered a significant Iowa defeat in 2020, coming in fourth place behind Pete Buttigieg, Bernie Sanders, and Elizabeth Warren, pulling ahead later in the race as other moderates dropped out and endorsed him.
In recent election cycles, the final candidate has typically emerged from the pack on Super Tuesday, a day during the primary season when a large number of states hold their elections at the same time.
Polling analysis from the website, Race to the WH, gave long odds to DeSantis in particular in the primary race. If the packed field of candidates never consolidates, he was predicted to win only his home state of Florida’s primary. If the field does thin out by early February, he was only predicted to win three states.
Newsweek reached out to the DeSantis and Pence campaigns via email for comment.
