On the Ground in Iowa: The Race for Second Place

Speaker 1 Sponsored by Novo Nordisk.

Speaker 2 Hi, I'm standing in quicksand.

Speaker 4 You can't see it, but it could be true.

Speaker 2 Having MASH can often be the same way.

Speaker 2 MASH, or metabolic dysfunction-associated steatoepatitis, is a potentially life-threatening liver disease you could have without knowing, especially if you have conditions like obesity, type 2 diabetes, or high triglycerides.

Speaker 2 You don't know if I'm in quicksand, and you won't know if you're at risk for MASH without talking to your doctor. Learn more at speakliver.com.

Speaker 5 Hey, Ryan Reynolds here, wishing you a very happy half-off holiday because right now, Mint Mobile is offering you the gift of 50% off unlimited.

Speaker 7 To be clear, that's half price, not half the service.

Speaker 5 And Mint is still premium unlimited wireless for a great price.

Speaker 8 So that means a half day.

Speaker 5 Yeah? Give it a try at mintmobile.com/slash switch.

Speaker 9 Upfront payment of $45 for three months plan equivalent to $15 per month required. New customer offer for first three months only.
Speeds low under 35 gigabytes of of networks busy.

Speaker 9 Taxes and fees extra.

Speaker 10 See MintMobile.com.

Speaker 11 We're in Des Moines.

Speaker 12 It's great here.

Speaker 13 We're excited. We're driving to a Ron DeSantis event where we may or may not get let in.

Speaker 14 We're heading to Waukee, which is

Speaker 13 kind of a western suburb of Des Moines.

Speaker 14 We're gonna go see if Ron DeSantis will let us into his little caucus event.

Speaker 16 What do you predict will happen?

Speaker 17 I predict

Speaker 15 that

Speaker 14 a stuffy Republican staffer in khakis who looks uncomfortably like me will deny us entry once we tell them we're from the crooked media, which in hindsight was not the smartest name for a company if you want to go to events like this.

Speaker 1 I'm Tommy Vitor and I'm on the ground in Iowa. This is episode two: The Race for Second Place.

Speaker 1 In the first episode of this series, we talked about the inevitability problem.

Speaker 1 The polls have Donald Trump so far ahead of everyone else that it feels like it's not a question of if, but when he's going to win the nomination.

Speaker 1 The other candidates seem to have all but given up on the idea of winning Iowa, and instead of taking on Trump directly, have spent the bulk of the campaign attacking each other, battling it out for silver.

Speaker 1 On January 15th, we will find out for sure.

Speaker 1 But I wanted to get a first-hand look at the campaign frenzy that happens in the last few weeks before caucus day, when many of Iowa's voters are finally making up their minds.

Speaker 1 So last week, I spent three days on the campaign trail, along with two producers, Caroline and Lacey.

Speaker 1 While we were there, Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, Vivek Ramaswamy, and Donald Trump were crisscrossing Iowa, making their case to anyone who would listen.

Speaker 1 We went to as many events as we could to see if the traditional strategy of holding town hall meetings, taking questions, and shaking as many hands as possible could still move the needle.

Speaker 1 It was kind of a bizarro homecoming for me. Iowa is a place I spent a lot of time and I really love.

Speaker 1 Our hotel was walking distance from my old apartment where I lived back in 2007 when I was working for the Obama campaign.

Speaker 1 It was kind of a time warp, an unsettling one. We went to a lot of the same communities I visited with Obama.

Speaker 12 We saw a bunch of familiar faces.

Speaker 1 But this time, Instead of hearing about hope and change, the candidates were offering a much darker vision of the country.

Speaker 1 Our first stop on our first day was a community center in Waukee, Iowa, in Dallas County.

Speaker 1 This was the first of 12 events DeSantis had planned over the next five days. He was one of the candidates who'd completed a full grassly, which is when you go to all 99 counties in the state.

Speaker 1 It's a classic example of what insiders call retail politics. That is, face-to-face campaigning where you're really selling your own candidacy voter by voter.

Speaker 1 The traditional view is that doing retail politics is how you win in the early states, especially in Iowa.

Speaker 14 When I was with Obama in 2007, 2008 in Iowa, by the end of the caucuses, we were doing four or five, six events a day,

Speaker 12 crisscrossing the state. I think we went to 73 counties

Speaker 23 total out of 99.

Speaker 18 It's tough. I mean, I don't know how these candidates keep their energy up.
for five events.

Speaker 18 I mean, imagine giving five speeches, doing five Q ⁇ As, and then having to be nice to every single person that talked to you.

Speaker 24 In the nicest state in America.

Speaker 17 In the nicest state of the planet. So you have to be nice.

Speaker 25 You have to be nice.

Speaker 14 That element of it, that like interpersonal political element, has certainly proven to be Ron DeSantis' great weakness.

Speaker 14 You know, the man can't seem to smile normally, let alone like have a normal interaction.

Speaker 18 So, you know, maybe doing five events a day is a bad idea if you're Ron DeSantis and you have kind of a repellent personality. We'll find out.

Speaker 27 Just to commit to voting at our caucus, but making sure

Speaker 1 The Waukee Community Center was a small, stuffy room with about 30 or 40, mostly retirees, packed in at tables and a couple dozen press.

Speaker 1 We walked in as concerned citizens because DeSantis campaign never responded to our request for media credentials.

Speaker 27 Our governor from Florida, Ron DeSantis, is here to make sure my district is held accountable.

Speaker 3 Thanks, Bob.

Speaker 3 Thanks so much, Congressman. God, thank you.
Good morning.

Speaker 3 Great to see y'all. Great to be back in Dallas County.
Happy New Year. Do y'all have a good one?

Speaker 1 DeSantis spoke for about 40 minutes straight in his signature monotone.

Speaker 27 We need to reverse the decline of this country. We need a new birth of freedom all throughout the land, and we need to usher in a revival of the American spirit.

Speaker 1 To borrow a Trump insult,

Speaker 1 DeSantis' speech was pretty low energy. Even his attempt at a stirring clothes fell flat.
But the most interesting part of these things is usually the Q ⁇ A.

Speaker 1 And at this event, an older gentleman using a walker raised his hand.

Speaker 3 Yes, sir.

Speaker 21 Can I be honest with you?

Speaker 21 Okay, so

Speaker 21 I think a lot of us voted for Trump. And I have a couple of questions.
For one, why haven't you gone directly after him?

Speaker 3 Polls are down.

Speaker 1 He's, you know. If you couldn't hear that, he said, a lot of us voted for Trump.
Why haven't you gone directly after him?

Speaker 27 What do you mean by going directly after him?

Speaker 3 I mean, you're

Speaker 21 in my viewpoint, you're going pretty soft on him.

Speaker 27 But what do you think? So, you know, because we, I've articulated all the differences time and time again on the campaigns through. I know.

Speaker 10 That's just not how I roll.

Speaker 3 Okay, good. But

Speaker 21 look at the last vote. If Trump had kept his mouth shut for the four years that he was president, he would have won a landslide.
I mean, the guy has no class in in a lot of different ways.

Speaker 1 This DeSantis supporter was asking a question that we've asked countless times on Pod Save America. Ron DeSantis is losing to Donald Trump in Iowa by about 30 points.

Speaker 1 How is he going to close that gap if he won't attack Trump or draw any kind of real contrast? For months, DeSantis has refused to give Republicans a reason to walk away from the former president.

Speaker 1 And he ends up looking paralyzed by his fear of upsetting the MAGA base. The result is a campaign that just hasn't been able to get off the ground.

Speaker 1 We went to two DeSantis events in Iowa, and we talked to a handful of people who'd come out to see him. A few of them genuinely liked what he had to say.

Speaker 10 Absolutely.

Speaker 3 Have you made up your mind?

Speaker 17 I absolutely have.

Speaker 17 I am a Ron DeSantis fan. Yeah, through and through.

Speaker 31 You know, that he's going to take some of his Florida experience and take it to the White House and get it done. And that's what we're lacking.
We're just floundering a lot.

Speaker 17 So I like what he said.

Speaker 1 We also talked with several who were still unconvinced.

Speaker 29 It was interesting. I don't know.
My wife and I are going to have a long talk about it and figure it out from there.

Speaker 32 Can I ask you what you thought of the meeting?

Speaker 17 Good meeting, yeah.

Speaker 33 Is the governor someone you're going to caucus for?

Speaker 34 Undecided yet, so

Speaker 35 but still up in the air for you.

Speaker 3 I want to win.

Speaker 1 But there was one conversation we had that really summed it all up. We spoke with the father and son outside DeSantis' event in Cumming, Iowa, next to a loud idling bus.

Speaker 36 DeSantis has better policy, a lot better things, but I just don't think he's as charismatic as Trump. And Trump can just come to a place like Iowa and just really, really rile it up.

Speaker 36 And here it just seemed it was kind of just a slow talk and slow burner. And

Speaker 36 he has good things to say, but it's just, it's not as captivating as Trump can be. You know, Trump has just viral moments every time he's anywhere.

Speaker 19 Yeah.

Speaker 36 And I just don't get the same.

Speaker 11 It's a little low energy, huh? Yep.

Speaker 30 But I'll tell you, I'm a lifelong Republican, I've seen with Ronald Reagan and the bushes.

Speaker 30 I will never vote for Donald Trump.

Speaker 36 I haven't the last two times,

Speaker 30 and I won't this time.

Speaker 12 What did he do that turned you off?

Speaker 30 I will never do business with or vote with somebody I don't trust.

Speaker 12 It's a good rule of thumb, if you ask me.

Speaker 11 Do you feel the same way?

Speaker 17 No.

Speaker 17 We're going to split in the family?

Speaker 11 That's the way it goes. Yeah.

Speaker 1 No one we talked to had an issue with DeSantis' policies. They liked what he was saying.
But DeSantis' events are just boring. He's not firing people up.

Speaker 1 He's not inspiring the audience with his vision for the future. No one seems to be having fun, Ron DeSantis included.

Speaker 1 So that leaves DeSantis with the Republican voters who refuse to vote for Trump and haven't yet decided on one of the other candidates. And it's unclear how big that pool of voters is.

Speaker 1 The narrative around DeSantis' campaign has been pretty grim lately.

Speaker 1 There was one story a few weeks ago that quoted a staffer saying they were at the point in the campaign where they were just trying to quote make the patient comfortable while they waited for the end to come.

Speaker 1 Never back down, the super PAC running DeSantis' field operation has also been in chaos.

Speaker 1 Tons of infighting, firings and resignations, tens of millions of dollars spent on door knocking, and yet DeSantis' poll numbers have been stuck between 15 to 20 percent for months.

Speaker 1 I even heard stories about paid canvassers knocking on doors and telling people they were actually planning to vote for Trump. It's been that bad.

Speaker 1 At the Iowa events I went to, DeSantis looked like he didn't want to be there. As the kids say, the guy's got no Riz.

Speaker 1 So, if DeSantis isn't breaking through, is anyone else? After the break, we board Vivek Ramaswamy's campaign bus to find out.

Speaker 24 The Kia Sportage Turbo Hybrid has a bold design, a spacious spacious interior with 232 horsepower, and a 12.3-inch panoramic display to keep the adventure going and fit with the way you live.

Speaker 24 And with Sirius XM, every drive comes alive, bringing you closer to the music, sports, talk, and podcasts you love right in your vehicle or on the Sirius XM app.

Speaker 24 Every Sirius XM-equipped Kia Sportage Turbo Hybrid includes a three-month trial subscription to SiriusXM, so the experience begins the moment you drive.

Speaker 24 Learn more at Kia.com/slash Sportage-Hybrid, Kia, movement that inspires.

Speaker 38 Year after year, Harry and David makes my family's holiday season feel special with treats handcrafted in Medford, Oregon.

Speaker 38 Harry and David still hand picks and packs every Royal Riviera pear, makes their iconic Moose Munch popcorn using the original recipe, and ties each bow by hand on their Tower of Treats gifts.

Speaker 38 And they all taste as good as everyone remembers. Make your own holiday magic and get 20% off site-wide at Harryandavid.com, promo code PAIR20.
That's HarryandDavid.com, code PAIR20.

Speaker 16 Hey, weirdos!

Speaker 39 I'm Elena, and I'm Ash, and we are the hosts of Morbid Podcast.

Speaker 16 Each week, we dive into the dark and fascinating world of true crime, spooky history, and the unexplained.

Speaker 39 From infamous killers and unsolved mysteries to haunted places and strange legends, we cover it all with research, empathy, humor, and a few creative expletives.

Speaker 16 It's smart, it's spooky, and it's just the right amount of weird.

Speaker 39 Two new episodes drop every week, and there's even a bonus once a month.

Speaker 16 Find us wherever you listen to podcasts. Yay! Woo! Aye!

Speaker 1 After watching DeSantis, we drove back to Des Moines for a Vivek Ramaswamy event. Ramaswamy is running, as far as I can tell, a completely unprecedented Iowa caucus campaign.

Speaker 1 He's done a double grassly, meaning he's visited every county in Iowa at least twice.

Speaker 1 I heard him tell a crowd that he will have done 330 events in Iowa in the last year, more than all the other candidates combined.

Speaker 1 I was really interested to see who showed up to a Ramaswamy event. His campaign had a moment back in the summer.
He started placing third in some national polls. He was omnipresent in the media.

Speaker 1 But that boomlet seems to have died down after some, frankly, obnoxious debate performances.

Speaker 3 Leave my daughter.

Speaker 1 And lately, Ramaswamy's campaign has taken on an even more conspiratorial tone. We'd reached out to the campaigns before our trip out to Iowa, and almost all of them ignored us.

Speaker 1 But Ramaswamy's people were nice, responsive, and open to an interview. We met up with the campaign at a holiday inn near the Des Moines airport.

Speaker 1 They rented out a hotel ballroom with a loud scarlet and black carpet for a midday town hall meeting.

Speaker 1 About 100 or so people came out to see him, and the crowd skewed quite a bit younger than the folks who came to DeSantis' waukee event.

Speaker 32 How many we all believe our country needs saving?

Speaker 3 Yes!

Speaker 3 Yes!

Speaker 1 Ramaswamy and his family walked through the crowd to the stage. Apurva, his wife, said said a few words, and then he made his case.

Speaker 21 Top question I got yesterday is,

Speaker 21 we have to make a choice. Why you, not Trump? And it's a fair question to ask.

Speaker 41 Slogan of this campaign is truth.

Speaker 42 So I'm not going to sugarcoat this for you, and I don't enjoy saying it.

Speaker 21 If you think they're going to

Speaker 21 let this man get anywhere near that White House again,

Speaker 42 I'm going to ask you to open your eyes.

Speaker 1 His speech was filled with oblique references to stuff you'd find on alt-right message boards.

Speaker 1 And he hit on some of his favorite talking points: the climate hoax, the fact that we're a nation of sheep, government corruption.

Speaker 1 During the QA, one woman in the audience actually apologized to Ramaswamy for asking a question about climate change at a previous event.

Speaker 40 I went home and I did my research, so I do owe you an apology because

Speaker 3 I.

Speaker 43 I appreciate you.

Speaker 21 I'll take an apology from the media.

Speaker 1 After the event, we stopped one young voter.

Speaker 35 I'm still a little bit tied on him versus Kennedy because I've been a longtime Kennedy supporter.

Speaker 41 That's interesting.

Speaker 3 So it's a little bit different.

Speaker 12 Is like vaccine safety your primary issue?

Speaker 35 That and communist China. Those are my top two.

Speaker 1 She was trying to decide whether to caucus for Ramaswamy or to backed renowned anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F.

Speaker 1 Kennedy Jr., who is running as an independent and not competing in Iowa, by the way. So this woman was not your typical Republican caucus goer.

Speaker 1 Ramaswamy calls himself a free speech absolutist, and the backdrop at all of his events says truth in big bold lettering.

Speaker 1 I watched his interview with Alex Jones on my flight out to Iowa, and I wanted to ask Ramaswamy about the tension between giving a liar like Alex Jones a platform while also saying you value the truth.

Speaker 1 After the Des Moines event, they brought us onto Ramaswamy's bus for the ride over to Newton, Iowa. His staff couldn't have been nicer.

Speaker 1 The candidate, however, seemed less than thrilled that he had to talk with me. But to his credit, he gave us about 20 minutes, so we dove right in.

Speaker 42 So anybody who tells you that they know what's going to happen this year, I think is

Speaker 42 probably deluding themselves.

Speaker 25 So I heard you say that at the event today, too.

Speaker 15 Like, they are going to try to prevent Trump.

Speaker 19 Like, they're not going to let Trump get to election day.

Speaker 25 Who is they there?

Speaker 42 Look at the collective they of the people who have taken whatever steps they are.

Speaker 42 Talking about state-level prosecutors, federal prosecutors, Supreme Courts comprised of elected judges in places like Colorado, secretaries of state in places like Maine, and I think all of whom are part of a broader establishment in this country, a mega donor class in both parties.

Speaker 42 The same people paying for lawsuits to keep Donald Trump off the ballot, and lawsuits against Trump are the same ones among the largest super PAC donors to Nikki Haley.

Speaker 42 I think that this is a broader... bipartisan establishment that has an anaphylactic reaction to this man.

Speaker 45 Are they working together? Is this some grand conspiracy to keep him off? This different component of the money? I think it is.

Speaker 42 I think what sometimes folks like yourself, or we don't know each other that well, but maybe

Speaker 42 folks in the media broadly will like to term a conspiracy theory, I better describe as

Speaker 46 the

Speaker 42 sum total of incentives in a system,

Speaker 42 collective incentives that are hiding in plain sight.

Speaker 42 So I don't think you have to be Inspector Crusoe to believe that the system is inventing legal theories on the fly for five simultaneous cases combined with extra-constitutional means of removing somebody from a ballot outside of the judicial system itself.

Speaker 47 I mean, do you think it's a novel legal theory to say you can't take classified information and keep it in the bathroom at your private club?

Speaker 42 That's not a novel legal theory if you're not the president of the United States. If you're the president of the United States, there's a law called the Presidential Records Act.

Speaker 46 It doesn't govern classified information.

Speaker 42 Actually, the president, actually, just to do your homework, the Presidential Records Act absolutely,

Speaker 42 the Presidential Records Act literally applies,

Speaker 42 the Presidential Records Act, just for a second, for the sake of your audience, literally covers classified documents.

Speaker 42 It is literally within the scope of what the Presidential Records Act encompasses.

Speaker 19 I don't want to believe it. I mean, I worked on the national security staff.

Speaker 25 I had the security clearance.

Speaker 47 The Presidential Record Act does not allow you to take classified information as an ex-president to your golf club, store it in unsecured.

Speaker 41 No, but it does allow the president to declassify.

Speaker 34 The sole, and the Supreme Court's held this in the Clinton Sock Drawer case otherwise.

Speaker 47 There's no evidence that he declassified anything.

Speaker 23 I'm jumping around a little bit because I know you are pressed for time and I appreciate you making time for us.

Speaker 47 I'm very worried about polarization in this country and what feels like the ratcheting up of rhetoric that you hear in political discourse.

Speaker 46 People talking about enemies, we're at war, etc. I know I've heard you talk about sort of similar concerns.

Speaker 17 But then I was watching your event on December 23rd.

Speaker 19 You said, we're in the middle of a war in this country.

Speaker 46 It's not some foreign war.

Speaker 47 It's a war right here on our own soil between those of us who love the United States of America and those of us who hate this country and want it to cease to exist.

Speaker 42 I think a fringe minority is what I've described that as.

Speaker 34 I think it's a fringe minority.

Speaker 42 I think it's less than about 10% of this country.

Speaker 41 And so

Speaker 42 I share your concerns about polarization.

Speaker 42 I think the path to national unity, though, is not going to come from some fake, superficial, surface-level rhetorical shift.

Speaker 47 I don't think so.

Speaker 42 I think it's going to come by actually...

Speaker 42 All of us re-embracing, or at least 90% of us re-embracing the radical ideals of the American Revolution, actually.

Speaker 46 By telling people they're at war with their fellow countrymen, does that help?

Speaker 42 I think the war, I think it helps to see with clarity, and yes, I do think it's a kind of cold cultural civil war in this country.

Speaker 42 I think it's not between Republicans and Democrats. I think it is between those who love this country and a fringe minority who wishes to apologize for the existence of our nation.

Speaker 42 I think we're ceasing to exist by the day.

Speaker 42 Yes, I do, actually.

Speaker 41 I feel like we're kicking ass and taking names all over the world.

Speaker 8 Are we, though?

Speaker 42 What do you you think George Washington would say if we had a candidate for U.S. president who a given Secretary of State on a given day woke up and just decided was eliminated from the ballot?

Speaker 25 I think he'd say, why do you guys all have teeth and I have these weird wooden things?

Speaker 34 Yeah, he might say that too.

Speaker 42 He might say that first. I don't know what he would say.
I don't think that. I think that we are slowly on a path to ceasing to exist right now unless we turn the tide we're on.

Speaker 42 And by ceasing to exist, I mean, sure, well, we have a geographic space where we have our, as I said at the last speech, different shades of melanin and walk in a geographic space and calling ourselves a country and doing what our smartphones tell us us to do on a given day.

Speaker 42 It's a dark vision of the future. Well, it's not a vision of the future.
It's an indictment of the present.

Speaker 42 But I think that my vision for the future is we still can be a country that's bound by that common purpose. That's what the United States of America was founded on.

Speaker 41 It was founded on our essential humanity.

Speaker 42 The things that makes us different than those two-legged or four-legged or any eight-legged higher mammals is that we can believe in something bigger than ourselves, that we can believe in those shared ideals of 1776.

Speaker 34 And those are radical ideals.

Speaker 42 Those are not soft, moderate, papered over, friendly, sounding, pleasant landing on the ear ideals.

Speaker 42 The idea that you get to speak your mind as long as I get to in return, that is a radical idea that for most of American history, not most of American history, for most of global history, was laughable.

Speaker 8 And here's the thing.

Speaker 42 I think many of the managerial class in the United States now find that idea laughable too. So in some sense, they're not the anomaly.
They're the norm for most of human history.

Speaker 47 I guess what I'm trying to figure out is where and when that overlaps with the other word on your placards, which is truth.

Speaker 47 And when I hear you say January 6th was an inside job, I don't think that's the right thing to do.

Speaker 42 Have you heard me say that the realities of

Speaker 8 the world are not going to be available?

Speaker 42 Looking increasingly like January 6th was the product of entrapment.

Speaker 33 But I'm not trying to follow.

Speaker 44 I mean, I think you're right to question, like to talk about Watergate or the Iraq War, but that still doesn't mean that thousands of people traped through the Capitol because the FBI led them in there.

Speaker 8 No, but

Speaker 34 I didn't say the FBI led them in there.

Speaker 42 And that's not how entrapment plays out. That's why I say, Regiment, this is not how the FBI does it.

Speaker 42 What we actually need to do is take off the partisan goggles and just ask ourselves what is, yes, this campaign of slogan of ours. What is the truth?

Speaker 17 Truth. Which is the dumpster.

Speaker 8 And the path to the truth.

Speaker 8 Here's what I'll say.

Speaker 41 I've been lied about it ever since.

Speaker 42 And they suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop story on the eve of that election.

Speaker 34 Oh, but what does that have to do with it?

Speaker 42 They look at polling data afterwards. It's truth.
That said many independents would have changed their mind on the eve of an election.

Speaker 42 I mean, are you, are you, but it's somebody who's saying the things you're going to say. I think it was.

Speaker 42 It was a damning indictment of the health of our republic that that was allowed to happen.

Speaker 12 I can tell you you're a smart guy.

Speaker 42 I can tell that we should have had a longer conversation than we were planning for right now. I was expecting something a little bit more disappointing than we had.
I'm saying that a good one.

Speaker 3 We have more conversations.

Speaker 29 At least you're thoughtful, which I appreciate.

Speaker 41 Puppets, you know,

Speaker 42 that joke has sort of a welcome.

Speaker 12 No, no, it's fine.

Speaker 42 I got to go into this event.

Speaker 1 The interview ended when we arrived at the next stop in Newton, about 40 minutes east of Des Moines.

Speaker 1 Ramaswamy spoke in the small dining room of a roadside restaurant where about 20 people were waiting for him.

Speaker 1 Classic retail politics.

Speaker 1 We stayed to listen. It was mostly the same stump, except a few minutes in when Ramaswamy pointed us out to the crowd.

Speaker 21 I was talking to, you know, some leftovers center podcast people who were with me on the bus on the way here. Oh, he's right here.

Speaker 21 What did you do for some podcasting, left, you know, linking podcasting? Positive America. Yeah.

Speaker 17 You guys should subscribe.

Speaker 13 It's great. You'll enjoy it.

Speaker 3 it you'll probably hate it any cover we had was now blown the whole room knew we were a bunch of libs and not surprisingly voters seemed less than eager to talk to us afterwards uh do you mind if i ask people what you thought of the event i i just i needed to get back to walk so we headed back to des Moines all right so what did you think about like the vibe of the events at this point in the campaign What you want to see is crowds that are growing and are more enthusiastic and people showing up who are not just going to caucus for you but also want to volunteer for you and knock on doors for you and tell their friends about you.

Speaker 22 And so I think what we saw today were some people who were enthusiastic for either candidate or deciding but there wasn't some insurgent energy that made me think that either of those guys were going to surprise us on caucus night.

Speaker 23 I could be wrong, you know?

Speaker 19 I mean, the Vic is betting on turning out a whole bunch of people that aren't on anyone's radar screen, that have never caucused before.

Speaker 46 They're not necessarily even Republicans.

Speaker 18 And that's how he's going to do better than expectations.

Speaker 1 DeSantis and Ramaswamy are the only candidates in the race who have gone all in on Iowa. They're running TV ads.
They visited all 99 counties.

Speaker 1 They even made a bunch of their staffers move from the campaign headquarters out to Iowa. That used to be the recipe for success.

Speaker 1 But this time around, based on the polls and the sparsely attended events we saw, it doesn't seem to be working.

Speaker 4 I've been asked by a lot of other folks about

Speaker 4 why aren't the normal rules of campaigning in Iowa working this time.

Speaker 1 That's political scientist and pollster Dave Peterson at Iowa State University, who you also heard from in episode one.

Speaker 4 I think it's because Iowans don't treat support in the caucuses like a participation trophy, right?

Speaker 4 You go to all 99 counties, you campaigned with people, you show up, you go to these events, you shake hands, you answer questions, and Iowans like that and they respect that and they demand that, but not because

Speaker 4 we just want people to show up and things, right? It's because we want to make a well-informed decision. And we do that,

Speaker 4 we demand that, and we reward that because we learn about the candidates, right? I mean, that's how campaigns work. People learn about the candidates.

Speaker 4 And even if you learn something about Haley or DeSantis, you already know you like Trump better. And they're not able to persuade you away from that.

Speaker 1 After the break, we find out if Republicans are passionate enough about Donald Trump that they'll even go watch his son Eric speak.

Speaker 14 Then we sneak into a private event with Dickie Haley.

Speaker 39 Hey weirdos, I'm Elena and I'm Ash and we are the host of Morbid Podcast.

Speaker 16 Each week we dive into the dark and fascinating world of true crime, spooky history and the unexplained.

Speaker 39 From infamous killers and unsolved mysteries to haunted places and strange legends, we cover it all with research, empathy, humor, and a few creative expletives.

Speaker 16 It's smart, it's spooky, and it's just the right amount of weird.

Speaker 39 Two new episodes drop every week, and there's even a bonus once a month.

Speaker 16 Find us wherever you listen to podcasts. Yay! Woo!

Speaker 51 Dogs deserve the best, and that means fresh, healthy food. Unlike other brands, Ollie offers five flavors that are as nutritious as they are delicious, all made in U.S.

Speaker 51 kitchens without harmful fillers or preservatives. Head to Ollie.com, tell them all about your dog, and use code HappyPup to get 60% off your welcome kit with a bonus.

Speaker 51 You'll get a storage container for a mess-free experience. And it comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee if your dog doesn't lick the bowl clean.

Speaker 20 The 2026 Chevy Equinox is more than an SUV.

Speaker 6 It's your Sunday tailgate and your parking lot snack bar.

Speaker 20 Your lucky jersey, your chairs, and your big cooler fit perfectly in your even bigger cargo space.

Speaker 20 And when it's go time, your 11.3-inch diagonal touchscreen's got the playbook, the playlist, and the tech to stay a step ahead.

Speaker 52 It's more than an SUV, it's your Equinox.

Speaker 20 Chevrolet, together let's drive.

Speaker 14 I mean, so right now we're 11 days out from the caucus.

Speaker 23 And like, I don't know, maybe it was because I was inside the bubble, but my memory of what it was like 11 days out in 2008 and 2007 was frenetic pace, huge events, growing momentum, like pitched battle with a lot of suspense.

Speaker 15 And the events we've been at have felt like a little small, a little sleepy.

Speaker 11 Just not like a lot of energy.

Speaker 13 We went to events in the middle of the day during the week. But I mean, to catch up to Donald Trump in Iowa, you need a massive ground swallow of support that has not shown up in any polls, right?

Speaker 17 But anyways, so we're going to see Eric Trump in Ankeny.

Speaker 13 It's a suburb about 20 minutes north of Des Moines.

Speaker 14 Now, if Eric Trump has bigger crowds in Des Moines than, you know, Vivek Ramaswamy or Ron DeSantis, that does not bode well for

Speaker 22 those two.

Speaker 1 It was a big room, maybe 150 people inside and lots of press. We must have been next to a livestock exhibition hall because it smelled distinctly like a barnyard.

Speaker 1 We stood on the sidelines and got asked twice if we'd signed a commit to caucus card yet.

Speaker 18 You guys had a chance to fill out a commit to caucus?

Speaker 46 No, we were going to watch Eric first and then check out.

Speaker 12 But But thank you so much. Are you on the campaign?

Speaker 11 Yeah.

Speaker 18 Are you guys worried about any of these other

Speaker 1 Eric delivered a surprisingly good speech? I know. No one is more shocked than I am that I just said that.
But he made an authentic pitch about his father's record while also humanizing the guy.

Speaker 26 And as we went to school every morning, I'd always go give him a kiss. And he would always say, Eric, you know, three things.
No drinking, no drugs. And no smoking.

Speaker 26 Every single morning, and I'm sitting there on the five-year-old kid dad, what the hell is Frank?

Speaker 3 I'm like,

Speaker 26 he's amazing, truly an amazing dad.

Speaker 3 We need a lot more of that.

Speaker 1 But the climax of the event was definitely when Eric called his dad.

Speaker 26 Say hi to the entire crowd.

Speaker 21 Well, I just want to thank everybody for

Speaker 3 we got the farmers of Iowa $28 billion into the money.

Speaker 26 And I can't think about Joe Biden doing that. He wouldn't even think about it and he wouldn't know how to do it.
But I just want to say, I look forward to seeing you on Friday.

Speaker 21 We love you all, and I hope my son is doing a great job because he always has some good job.

Speaker 1 After the event, with Toby Keith's courtesy, the red, white, and blue glaring in the background, we chatted up some voters. The first person we talked to was a woman named Deborah.

Speaker 1 She was totally decked out in Trump gear and was holding a bottle of Trump-branded wine for some reason.

Speaker 49 My name is Deborah.

Speaker 18 Deborah, Deborah, thank you so much. Yeah, thank you.

Speaker 41 Might if we use this on our podcast, we're just talking to a shower.

Speaker 32 Yeah, no, that's fine. We love Trump.
We need a warrior, and we love how his family is so tightly knit. Like, that's beautiful.
That's what our country is founded on, like,

Speaker 32 togetherness and to be close and to be family and what it means to be an American. And that's a family that has proven and shown that to us.
And we love it. They're great.

Speaker 45 Do you think there's really an actual race going on, or is this thing over?

Speaker 32 Okay, you're the news person. You're asking me this.

Speaker 32 I can honestly tell you I'm the top Trump volunteer in the state of Iowa, so I've made almost 200,000 calls and door knocked. Yeah, I've done a lot.
It's 24-7.

Speaker 32 I have. So I can honestly tell you that this is Trump country.

Speaker 1 We also spoke with two pastors who told us they were 100% Trump fans.

Speaker 54 Do you think that there's any contests happening here? Did you consider any other candidates?

Speaker 41 Do you think any of them have a chance?

Speaker 54 Well, I'll tell you.

Speaker 8 Yes, yes, ma'am.

Speaker 3 No way.

Speaker 49 No way.

Speaker 54 Trump proved himself.

Speaker 53 And it really, it kind of infuriates me, really, that these people are coming up and running.

Speaker 3 What are they running for?

Speaker 16 Wait your turn.

Speaker 54 He was a Republican president.

Speaker 54 He was a Republican president that proved himself.

Speaker 54 Why?

Speaker 54 It angers me. Every day I go to the mailbox and we've got four or five big pieces of paper, the the thick paper, they're wasting Republican money,

Speaker 54 we should be fighting the demon craps. And that's what I call them demon craps

Speaker 54 because everything about their policy is totally from hell. They're just demonic.

Speaker 54 It's just showing itself.

Speaker 54 And we haven't seen the fruit of all what they've sown yet. You know, I'm really,

Speaker 54 unless our country turns around,

Speaker 54 unless Donald Trump can get back in and really fight to bring back sanity, we're going to just be into terrible trouble.

Speaker 1 Donald Trump's path to the nomination seems almost assured. But there's one candidate that probably has the best shot at competing with the ex-president in the months to come.
That's Nikki Haley.

Speaker 1 Haley has been surging in the polls in New Hampshire, and she's betting that her home state of South Carolina will turn out for her.

Speaker 1 For the last year, The Trump campaign spent most of its time hammering Ron DeSantis. But recently, they've refocused on Haley, spending $4.5 million on attack ads this past week.

Speaker 1 Haley was campaigning in New Hampshire for the first few days of our trip, but now she was back in Iowa. We knew she had two events on her schedule, but neither were open to the public.

Speaker 1 And her campaign had been ignoring our emails, which, look, I get it. We're the liberal media.
But it was our last day, so we had to try.

Speaker 57 It's technically a rotary club meeting.

Speaker 14 We barely know what that is.

Speaker 18 We think it has to do with volunteering of some sort, since Lacey is a rotary expert.

Speaker 33 I got a scholarship in high school.

Speaker 57 See, that's what I said. She's expert.

Speaker 40 More importantly, though, what time is it?

Speaker 12 Oh, it's dark out.

Speaker 14 It's 7.05 in the morning on Friday.

Speaker 1 We parked the car and rode an elevator to the holiday inn lobby, where we found a couple of very nice young guys manning a folding table.

Speaker 46 Yeah, I'm sorry, it's a closed event.

Speaker 3 We can't let anyone in.

Speaker 1 So we helped ourselves to the lobby coffee and waited for it to be over in hopes that we could talk with some voters on their way out of the event.

Speaker 1 Nikki Haley's surge has been the story of the campaign for the last several weeks. She received a major influx of cash from the coke-funded super PAC Americans for Prosperity.

Speaker 1 But recently, she had a string of gaffes, ones that I'm sure were creating headaches for the staffers we met outside of the Rotary Club meeting.

Speaker 1 First, at a town hall in New Hampshire, she was asked what she thought caused the Civil War, and somehow she failed to mention slavery. Then, she pointedly declined to change her answer.

Speaker 40 What do you want me to say about slavery?

Speaker 9 Next question.

Speaker 1 Later, she told a group of New Hampshire voters that they would correct Iowa's vote.

Speaker 58 I trust every single one of you. You know how to do this.
You know, Iowa starts it. You know that you correct it.
You know that you continue to go.

Speaker 58 And my sweet state of South Carolina brings it home. That's what we do.
That's what we do.

Speaker 1 Haley said she was just kidding around, and everyone was overreacting to a little good-natured early state trash talk from a South Carolinian. But DeSantis and Eric Trump made a meal out of that one.

Speaker 26 And Haley's not doing too well either, especially after Dad. I'm not sure if you saw her comment today.
It wasn't exactly artful, but I think she upset most of Iowa.

Speaker 1 This dumb little fight fed the media narrative for a couple of days, but it felt like a relic from a different era in politics.

Speaker 1 Donald Trump's lawyer is in court, literally arguing that the president can order the U.S. military to kill his political rival.
Does anyone actually care about some dumb joke about Iowa?

Speaker 1 I really wanted to hear what the Rotary Club members thought about Haley's speech. After about an hour of crappy holiday and coffee, the event let out.
The first folks we met were a younger couple.

Speaker 1 The wife was actually a Democrat, and the husband told us he didn't remember how long it's been since he voted Republican.

Speaker 50 Hearing her and what she has to say is enlightening and refreshing.

Speaker 50 And she speaks from more of a middle perspective and it's great to hear.

Speaker 33 I really liked what she said. I think I come just out of curiosity and as a woman

Speaker 33 but so I

Speaker 33 am really open. I think she's really polished.
I think she's going to get a lot of traction here in Iowa, especially if people can see her live.

Speaker 1 We also spoke with another Rotary Club member named Joe.

Speaker 10 I just wonder what you folks thought How she did.

Speaker 59 So, okay.

Speaker 60 Yeah, I thought she did really well. I actually am an undecided caucus

Speaker 60 participant and I thought she did hello herself really well. I thought she does a good job of explaining why she's where she is in the various issues.
So I was actually really impressed.

Speaker 12 Did she help you decide?

Speaker 60 I'm still like unbelievably undecided. Usually by this point I've like I've never missed a caucus my life never missed a vote in my life and I've I'm I am totally undecided.

Speaker 60 Outside of one decision I know I'm not making.

Speaker 12 Is that Donald Trump? That would be him.

Speaker 31 yeah i'm

Speaker 60 what what's preventing you from making a decision like what's what's still the question in your mind so i use the example of like when obama was doing it and people would like sleep in tents to like go for obama like i don't have that feeling for any of these candidates yet maybe say i'm 38 now you know and i'm just don't want to sleep in a tent for a candidate but i don't have that like jump out of bed tell everyone about the candidate feeling yet um i think vape gives you the best version of that but there's also like a lot of things that come with that so i don't know finally we talked with dave and mary Mary, who told us they liked that Nikki Haley served up policy solutions rather than platitudes.

Speaker 33 Can we ask you a couple questions about what you thought?

Speaker 61 It was probably a record-breaking number of people who were up there today, and many of us to hear her for the first time, you know, face to face, and to hear some of her solutions.

Speaker 61 Very strong on national defense, very strong on

Speaker 61 the economy,

Speaker 61 very strong on the border,

Speaker 61 and she seems to be somebody that she could uh give a

Speaker 61 strong consideration to she's still undecided for sure yeah yeah we have until next week i want someone who's going to be able to beat joe biden what scares the hell out of me is say these words president kamala harris okay so is electability kind of a big consideration for you yeah i think so you know uh in this time i think donald trump did a great uh service to this country but i think it's time to move beyond the chaos And she stressed that, by the way.

Speaker 61 Let's don't trade

Speaker 61 Republican chaos for the Democratic chaos that we're now experiencing. And that's probably what four more years of Trump would do.

Speaker 12 So, who are you folks deciding between at this point?

Speaker 56 Nikki Haley is very high in my regard, and then probably

Speaker 56 DeSantis would be the other one. But

Speaker 56 I'm leaning very heavily toward Nikki

Speaker 3 very much. Yep.

Speaker 1 Based on the people we talked to, Nikki Haley would kick ass in a Rotary Club caucus. Civic-minded moderates to conservatives who by and large were pretty skeptical of Donald Trump.

Speaker 1 Still, we wanted to hear Haley for ourselves, and we learned that we'd have one more chance exactly 12 hours later that day at an event hosted by an organization that encourages Gen Z Republicans to run for office.

Speaker 1 The event was at a members-only club in a skyscraper in downtown Des Moines. And while it was open to credentialed media, they told us our request had come in too late.

Speaker 1 But we showed up anyway, perhaps a little underdressed, and walked in. It was kind of an odd event.

Speaker 1 The governor of New Hampshire, Chris Sununu, was there to moderate, even though it's not his home state. And the questions were just softballs, ranging from, do you like to cook, Nikki?

Speaker 40 Michael didn't cook, we wouldn't need.

Speaker 1 To, and this is a quote, how did you become the ambassador of the UN?

Speaker 40 I went in with the mindset that I wanted countries to know what America was for and what America was against. I didn't care if they didn't like me, but I wanted them to respect America.

Speaker 1 Governor Sununu even compared Haley to his favorite diplomat of all time.

Speaker 21 I think you were the best, you know, foreign policy leader we've had since Henry.

Speaker 1 That would be Henry Kissinger, of course, the one who did all the genocides. After about 45 minutes or so, the campaign kicked us and all the rest of the press corps out of the event.

Speaker 1 Meanwhile, two hours north,

Speaker 1 Donald Trump held a rally in Mason City to a packed room.

Speaker 59 Oh, we're going to take our country back. We're going to take it back.

Speaker 1 Trump seemed more worried about his voters not turning out the caucus than he did about any of his rivals.

Speaker 59 And boy, I tell you,

Speaker 59 the biggest risk is you say, you know, we're winning by so much, darling. Let's stay home and watch television.
Let's watch this great victory.

Speaker 59 And if enough people do that, it's not going to be pretty. But we're not going to let that happen.
You know, I'm.

Speaker 1 We headed back to the hotel.

Speaker 3 Tommy. Yo.

Speaker 33 That was the last event.

Speaker 35 How are you feeling?

Speaker 12 So tired.

Speaker 12 We've been doing this for what? We've been doing this for 13, 14 hours today.

Speaker 14 It's been a long day.

Speaker 12 I mean, one thing that I took away from this that surprises me every year,

Speaker 12 happened in 2007, 2008, it happened in 2016, happened in 2020, it happened this year is the number of people who tell you they're still undecided, like 10 or 11 days out from the Caucasus, is shocking.

Speaker 12 Because we're all obsessed and we're focused on this and we're worrying about it all the time, but they are not because they're normal human beings. So things break late all the time in Iowa.

Speaker 12 Iowa can surprise you, but it still feels like Trump is well in the lead.

Speaker 1 Wednesday night was the final debate before caucus night. Only Trump, Haley, and DeSantis qualified, but Trump refused to participate, just as he had in every prior debate this cycle.

Speaker 1 It was the first time Haley and DeSantis went head-to-head without any other candidates on the stage.

Speaker 49 Live from Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, this is the CNN Republican presidential debate.

Speaker 1 Ron DeSantis went after Nikki Haley, as he has for the past several weeks, attacking her conservative bona fides.

Speaker 37 You know, I debated the governor of California, Gavin Newsom. You know, I thought he lied a lot.
Man, Nikki Haley gives him a run for his money, and she may even be more liberal than Gavin Newsom is.

Speaker 1 And Nikki Haley shot back.

Speaker 55 Every time he lies, Drake University, don't turn this into a drinking game because you will be overserved by the end of the night.

Speaker 1 It was a last-ditch effort to distinguish themselves as the best candidate to Iowa voters. But without the frontrunner on the debate stage, we'll see if any of this ends up mattering.

Speaker 1 On January 15th, Iowa Republicans will head to about 1,500 caucus locations to vote.

Speaker 1 If Trump can pull off a victory in Iowa after barely visiting the state, it does make me wonder about the future of of retail politics and the early state process itself.

Speaker 1 At a time when partisan news and social media algorithms are pushing us further into our bubbles, maybe future candidates will decide that they don't need to drive around Iowa to win.

Speaker 1 I think the death of retail politics would be a terrible thing for the country and bad for nostalgia chasing political hacks like me who know that the early states are the best part of the campaign.

Speaker 1 That's when you can just walk into an event, shake a candidate's hand, and ask them a question. In a few months, all that will change.

Speaker 1 Town halls will be replaced by massive rallies and the public will be separated from the politicians by Secret Service and officious campaign staffers.

Speaker 1 Our presidential primary process is weird and flawed and has on occasion delivered us disastrous results.

Speaker 1 But at least people in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina show up and take the process seriously.

Speaker 1 That seems far better than a future where the biggest celebrity in the race just posts their way to the nomination.

Speaker 1 On the Ground in Iowa is an original series from Pod Save America and Crooked Media. I'm your host, Tommy Vitor.
Lacey Roberts is our senior producer.

Speaker 1 Alona Minkowski is our producer with production help from Ashley Mizzuo and Evan Walton. Our executive producers are Reed Cherlin and Katie Long.
Original music by Hannes Brown.

Speaker 1 Sarah Gibbel Laska from Chapter 4 is our sound designer and engineer, with audio support from Kyle Seglund and Charlotte Landis. Madeline Heritcher is our head of news and programming.

Speaker 1 Matt DeGroote is our head of production. Thanks to our digital team, Phoebe Bradford, Haley Jones, Mia Kelman, Caroline Dunphy, Dylan Villanueva, and Molly Lobel.

Speaker 1 Special thanks to Andy Taft, Alex Hernandez, Kayla Moriarty, and the Pod Save America team.

Speaker 1 If you want to get ad-free episodes, exclusive content, and more, consider joining our Friends of the Pod subscription community at crooked.com slash friends.

Speaker 1 And if you're already doom scrolling, don't forget to follow us at Pod Save America on Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube for access to full episodes, bonus content, and more.

Speaker 1 Plus, if you're as opinionated as we are, consider dropping us a review.

Speaker 48 Finding the music you love shouldn't be hard. That's why Pandora makes it easy to explore all your favorites and discover new artists and genres you'll love.

Speaker 48 Enjoy a personalized listening listening experience simply by selecting any song or album, and we'll make a station crafted just for you.

Speaker 6 Best of all, you can listen for free.

Speaker 48 Download Pandora on the Apple App Store or Google Play and start hearing the soundtrack to your life.

Speaker 52 There's a reason Chevy trucks are known for their dependability. It's because they show up no matter the weather, push forward no matter the terrain, and deliver.

Speaker 52 That's why Chevrolet has earned more dependability awards for trucks than any other brand in 2025, according to JD Power.

Speaker 52 Because in every Chevy truck, like every Chevy driver, dependability comes standard. Visit Chevy.com to learn more.

Speaker 52 Chevrolet received the highest total number of awards among all trucks in the JD Power 2025 U.S. Vehicle Dependability Study.
Awards based on 2022 models, newer models may be shown.

Speaker 52 Visit jdpower.com/slash awards for more details.

Speaker 6 Chevrolet, together, let's drive.