After nearly a year of campaigning, more than $123 million in advertising and an inglorious ending, the Iowa caucuses ended the way the race began: Donald Trump, the front-runner, was declared the winner before most of the votes had even been cast.
Trump's landslide victory once again demonstrated his enduring dominance of the Republican Party.
Far behind him, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis narrowly edged out Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina.
Florida Gov. and Republican presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis arrives at an observation party during the 2024 Iowa Republican presidential caucuses in West Des Moines, Iowa, on Jan. 15, 2024. DeSantis took a second-place finish Monday in the Iowa caucuses, U.S. media projected, as the Florida governor sought to paint the GOP nomination as a battle between himself and front-runner Donald Trump. (Photo by Christian Monterrosa / AFP)
His tight finish gave both a reason to continue their campaigns, which is likely to help Trump.
The race now heads to New Hampshire, a more moderate state in both temperature and temperament, where polls show Haley with more support.
After so many months of attacks between her and DeSantis, the old political trope is fulfilled: in 2024, there are three "tickets" to get out of Iowa.
But Trump drives away on a bullet train.
Here are five takeaways.
Trump picked up support from all sides.
While his rivals spent weeks campaigning across the state, Trump flew to Iowa only a dozen times.
A poster announcing former U.S. President and Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump's victory in Iowa is displayed at an observation party during the 2024 Iowa Republican presidential caucuses in Des Moines. (Photo by Jim WATSON/AFP)
Key Republican figures in the state, such as Gov. Kim Reynolds and top evangelical leaders, supported his rivals.
However, when Trump took the stage to deliver his victory speech, he appeared on track to win 98 of the state's 99 counties, with him and Haley neck-and-neck in last.
Trump's sweep of the caucuses was broad and deep.
He outperformed DeSantis in conservative strongholds, including northwest Iowa, which is home to many evangelical voters who were heavily courted by the Florida governor.
Republican presidential candidate and former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley speaks to the crowd at a caucus night party in West Des Moines, Iowa, U.S., Jan. 15, 2024. REUTERS/Jeenah Moon
And even in the more moderate suburban counties surrounding Des Moines, which were considered favorable ground for Haley, Trump won, albeit by much narrower margins.
Tech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, who presented himself as a younger heir to Trump's MAGA movement, garnered less than 8% of the vote.
He quickly suspended his campaign and endorsed Trump on Monday night.
Much of the battle in Iowa had revolved around expectations:
Would Trump win more than 50% of the vote?
Even as he boasted of his huge lead in the polls, his aides tried to lower the bar to a margin of victory of 12 percentage points, the largest ever recorded in a competitive Republican presidential race in the state.
With the former president's 51% to DeSantis' 21% and Haley's 19%, he topped both scores.
DeSantis won a pyrrhic fight for second place.
Although he edged out Haley for second place, it's hard to see a clear path forward for DeSantis — and it's unclear how long he'll have enough money to move forward.
DeSantis had staked his campaign on Iowa and promised more than once that he would win the caucuses.
DeSantis checked all the boxes normally required to win in Iowa.
He visited all 99 counties, stopped in small towns and bars, and answered questions from locals and the press.
He won over Reynolds and used the vast network of evangelical leader Bob Vander Plaats.
Its super political action committee spent tens of millions of dollars on a door-knocking program of unparalleled magnitude.
He tried to run to Trump's right — portraying him as insufficiently conservative — and the strategy failed.
There simply weren't enough Republicans who wanted to abandon Trump.
Now, he's targeting nominating states that are far less hospitable and where he enjoys none of the ideological advantages he had in Iowa.
He faces more moderate voters in New Hampshire — where he is third or even fourth in the polls — and is expected to lose to Trump in Nevada, where the next caucuses will be held.
If DeSantis remains in the race beyond that point, he would move on to South Carolina, where Trump is well-liked and where Haley is a former governor.
Haley's rising hopes were dashed.
Compared to last summer's expectations, Haley had an encouraging night, though only her most deluded supporters were able to squint enough to see a path to ultimate victory.
For most of last year, Haley didn't make it past single digits in Iowa polls.
He had little money and no field organization.
DeSantis enjoyed an overwhelming advantage in money, staff, and local support.
Haley ended up very close to DeSantis by consolidating the party's marginalized anti-Trump bloc and assembling a coalition of college-educated Republicans, independents and even some Democrats who live in urban and suburban areas.
And he slaughtered DeSantis on television, with allies spending more than $20 million on attack ads against him.
Haley had a difficult last few weeks as media scrutiny intensified on her.
Mistakes like the one he made when asked about the Civil War may have slowed his momentum in the final week before the caucuses.
A near-perfect performance from here on out — and more than a few lucky breaks — will be needed for him to give Trump anything resembling a competitive race.
Haley sees more fertile ground in New Hampshire, where she must prove she can defeat Trump, or at least get close enough to justify keeping her campaign alive until her home state of South Carolina on Feb. 24.
Turnout was low for icy and undramatic caucuses.
Turnout was well below the last contested Republican caucuses in 2016, when nearly 187,000 Iowans helped choose their party's nominee.
This year, only about 110,000 people participated.
The low turnout could be another mark against a peculiar process that has come under intense criticism in recent years.
Turnout projections had varied wildly, with snow and freezing temperatures creating an unpredictability that left campaigns scrambling to figure out what the night would look like.
Trump's status as a de facto candidate, combined with the cancellation of campaign appearances in recent days, meant that the caucuses lacked the suspense of the Democratic race four years ago.
Those 2020 caucuses were marred by problems in data communication.
That mess, as well as concerns that a predominantly white state didn't reflect the diversity of the Democratic Party, led President Joe Biden to delay Iowa in the party's presidential nominating calendar.
Four years later, Trump proved that caucuses could be won without much institutional support from Iowa Republicans — or even without spending much time in the state — and raised new questions about the future of the Iowa race.
Iowa doesn't mean much to the fall.
Despite Trump's history, the results in solidly red Iowa offer no meaningful clues for the 2024 general election.
There is little doubt that Trump has brought about a major political realignment within the Republican Party, and on Monday night he demonstrated the commitment of his supporters, with many risking dangerous weather to venture out for a chance to endorse him.
There is also little doubt that his political operation is far more sophisticated than it was in 2016.
The caucuses — with their 19 p.m. meeting time and lengthy process — bear little resemblance to voting in most parts of the country.
They also attract only a fraction of the share:
About 15% of the nearly 720,000 registered Republicans in Iowa participated this year.
Even in the strongest years, caucuses have a dismal record when it comes to choosing the Republican nominee.
In the seven Republican races held since 1980, only two winners in Iowa have landed the party's nomination:
Sen. Bob Dole of Kansas in 1996 and Gov. George W. Bush of Texas in 2000.
The vast majority of Republican voters are likely to turn to Trump in a general election.
But what his grip on them in Iowa means for a brutal campaign fought over tens of thousands of undecided voters, who are far less conservative, is harder to guess.
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