- Iowa Republicans gather at the state’s caucuses to pick a candidate on Monday
- The final poll sees Trump lose three points but he is still the clear favorite
- Behind him
Donald Trump is on course for a huge win in the Iowa caucuses, according to the final poll before decision day which forecasts he will take 48 percent of the vote.
However, the NBC News/Des Moines Register/Mediacom Iowa shows that it is Nikki Haley who continues her rise, cutting into Trump’s lead and giving her a clear second place with 20 percent.
That leaves Florida governor Ron DeSantis in third with 16 percent.
The state is the first in the nation to pick its preferred candidate, and can make or break campaigns.
On Saturday evening, Ann Selzer, the state’s best-known and most-accurate pollster, released her much-anticipated final poll before caucus day.
Donald Trump has been crushing his opponents in Iowa polls. But things get real on Monday evening at 7pm when Republicans caucus to pick their favored candidate. The final poll before caucus puts him on 48 percent support – three points less than the same poll in December
Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis are locked in battle for second place in Iowa
Her poll in December had Trump with 51 percent, DeSantis on 19 percent, and Haley on 16 percent.
It means the former president has slipped slightly, while it is Haley, former governor of South Carolina, that has the momentum as the candidates get to the business of the race.
Rabble rousing tech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy comes fourth with eight percent.
Trump lost Iowa in 2016 to Ted Cruz, who was better able to court the state’s big evangelical vote.
This time around, the Trump campaign has left nothing to chance, building out a big ground game to get the vote out on Monday, and hitting rivals hard.
However, a string of polls that put him 30 points ahead of his nearest rivals mean that anything short of a record-breaking win will be seen as a poor result and give DeSantis and Haley encouragement to push on.
For his part, DeSantis has gambled much of his campaign resources on Iowa. He knows that New Hampshire, the next state to make its decision, is less fertile ground for his conservative, anti-woke message.
In contrast, Haley is polling well in the Granite State and can afford a modest showing in Iowa.
They returned to campaign events Saturday, battling frigid weather to reach Republicans who have 48 hours to make up their minds.
Haley put in appearance in the college town of Iowa City, one of the state’s most Democratic areas. It is in keeping with her efforts to win over independents and moderates.
Republican presidential candidate businessman Vivek Ramaswamy is on eight percent
Both challengers finished the day with events in the Mississippi River town of Davenport, one of the more Republican towns in the east of the state.
In contrast, Trump abandoned plans for two rallies and instead called in to ‘tele-rallies.’
DeSantis ridiculed his strategy.
‘We’re in, we’re showing up. Donald Trump has phoned it in. He’s going to be in Mar-a-Lago. It’s probably 75 degrees there,’ he told supporters in Council Bluffs, where the outside temperature was -5F.
The bitter weather could throw another twist into a notoriously hard-to-predict system.
Campaigns will have to work even harder to make sure they get their supporters to Monday’s caucuses.
