Trump steps up competition with DeSantis in planning Iowa trip | US

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The competition between Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis is intensifying as the former president schedules a trip back to Iowa on the same day that the Florida governor will be in the state to kick off the Republican contest for the White House.

A Trump campaign official said Saturday that the former president plans to come to Iowa on May 13 to headline an organizing rally in a sprawling park in downtown Des Moines. DeSantis was then set to headline the Iowa Rep.’s annual summer fundraiser. Randy Feenstras in northwest Iowa and speak at a party fundraiser later that evening in Cedar Rapids.

The Trump campaign official, who requested anonymity to discuss the trip before it was announced, said the Des Moines organizing rally has been in the planning stages for weeks and aims to identify caucus supporters and volunteers.

The move is a sign of the intensifying competition between the two men who, at least for now, are the leading contenders for the Republican presidential nomination. Trump and his allies have stepped up their efforts to attack and marginalize DeSantis, who is expected to announce his White House bid shortly after the Florida Legislature wraps up its work this coming week.

But Trumps trip was also notable for its emphasis on the kind of ground-level organizing that is important in Iowa politics and was often missing during his 2016 campaign, when Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and won the states GOP caucuses.

Trump is almost single-handedly focused on swaying DeSantis, whom he has attacked for his policy positions on entitlement reform, his loyalty to conservative causes, even his personality. Although DeSantis largely ignored Trumps jabs, a pro-DeSantis super political action committee, Never Back Down, began responding to paid ads this month.

The stakes for both men are particularly high in Iowa, where the February caucuses offer opportunities for them to solidify their status at the top of the GOP. A poor performance, however, would provide an opening for other Republicans to mount a renewed campaign.

Trumps 2016 Iowa campaign was a disparate seat-of-the-pants operation run by campaign newcomers who, along with the candidate, had no idea what caucuses were. The roughly 1,700 precinct-level Republican political meetings, vestiges of prairie civic life, include a question of presidential preference but require in-person participation on a typically cold winter night.

Eight years ago, Trumps Iowa team left contact information for about 10,000 Iowans interested in supporting him unprocessed before the caucuses, where Trump led the lead-up to polls, but failed against Cruz’s more organized campaign.

Using not only refined 2016 caucus data but information collected during two national campaigns, Trumps advisers say they are developing a data and digital engagement strategy they say will put him in position to win the caucuses. It’s an expectation that Iowa GOP strategists say is an absolute must for the former president, who comfortably carried Iowa in the 2016 and 2020 general elections.

Meanwhile, Never Back Down, run by DeSantis 2022 Florida re-election campaign senior strategist, Phil Cox, has named Iowa Republican operatives to its roster as it seeks to reach out to interested GOP activists as the Iowa 2024 campaign begins. Among them is Ryan Koopmans, the former chief of staff of Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds.

The group has been airing TV ads in Iowa and other early voting states, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada, for several weeks, and plans to launch a new one on Monday.

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