With just one day to go until Iowa’s presidential caucuses, the candidates are urging their supporters to brave bone-chilling cold and blustery wind to help carry them through Republicans’ leadoff voting contest.
The final Des Moines Register/NBC News poll before Monday night’s caucuses found former President Donald Trump maintaining a formidable lead, supported by nearly half of likely caucusgoers. Nikki Haley, the former U.N. ambassador and South Carolina governor, and Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor, remain locked in a close battle for second.
Trump, Haley and DeSantis are fanning out across Iowa on Sunday to meet with voters. Already, Haley was forced to cancel an in-person stop because of poor weather conditions.
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INDIANOLA — Marc Smiarowski hunched to fight off the minus 18-degree chill outside the Kent Student Center on Simpson College campus Sunday morning, waiting for doors to open for former President Donald Trump’s midday rally at the small school south of Des Moines.
But as the weak winter sun hung low in the sky, a sense of bitterness burned in Smiarowski.
“I’m here in part out of spite,” said the 44-year-old public utility worker, who drove 40 miles to be there. “I can’t abandon him. After what they did to him in the last election, and the political persecution he faces, I feel like I owe him this. He’s our only option.”
“No one else could handle what he’s facing,” added his friend Kailie Johnson, a 26-year-old dental hygienist from the same small town of Huneston.
More than 30 minutes before the center opened, more than 100 people stood in line while layered in Carhartt coveralls with hats and hoods pulled down tight. It was a test run for Iowa’s caucuses Monday and of the devotion Trump said last week would make his supporters “walk on glass” for him.
DUBUQUE — Haley’s campaign stop in Dubuque was canceled Sunday morning because of poor travel conditions, the campaign said about an hour before the scheduled event.
Voters walking into the venue were given the news by campaign staffers, who offered some a T-shirt, hat or yard sign as consolation.
John Schmid, 69, was already waiting at the venue when the event was called off.
“I don’t blame her,” said the retiree from Asbury, a few miles outside Dubuque. He’s already a Haley supporter, but he wanted to see the “refreshing” candidate in person. He hopes Haley will do well in Monday’s caucuses, which he’ll be at despite the bitter cold.
“It’s just part of living in Iowa in January,” he said.
Haley swapped the in-person event with a virtual town hall.
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