The Iowa Republican Party is proceeding with a presidential nominating caucus in 2020 — unlike the last times incumbent GOP presidents were up for re-election in 1992 and 2004 — potentially offering a high-profile staging ground for a Republican challenger to President Trump.
Iowa GOP Chairman Jeff Kaufmann said he remains a steadfast Trump supporter and expects most Republican caucus-goers do also. But with an eye toward preserving Iowa’s status as the host of the first nominating contest of each presidential cycle, Kaufmann urged members of the state party to hold a caucus and open it to all Republicans who qualify. The party’s central committee agreed.
“I am not going to endorse, and the party is not going to endorse” in the primary, Kaufmann told the Washington Examiner on Wednesday. “We feel that’s important because we want to be the first-in-the-nation state in 2024 and 2028.”
As Trump’s re-election campaign ramps up, a key component is preparing to quash possible primary challenges. Incumbent presidents who faced primaries are in greater peril in the general election, a fact not lost on the Trump campaign and the GOP more broadly.
In Iowa, the president is solid with Republican voters and would almost certainly defeat any intraparty opposition. But according to a fresh poll from CNN and the Des Moines Register, there is some appetite to hear from alternatives. In the survey, 67 percent of Iowa Republicans said they would “definitely” support Trump in 2020, but 29 percent are open to backing another GOP candidate.
To minimize potential political hurdles for Trump, some state parties could scrap their 2020 presidential primaries. Indeed, the South Carolina Republican Party revealed to the Washington Examiner that it might do just that. Moves like that, in enough states, could further hamstring any Republican who dares to run against Trump in 2020.
It’s happened before — in Iowa — when less uncertainty swirled around an incumbent Republican president. In 1992, the Iowa GOP didn’t issue a presidential ballot during its caucus, to save former President George H.W. Bush from being embarrassed by Pat Buchanan. Bush was forced to face Buchanan in New Hampshire, and although he won, he did not finish as strong as he had hoped, foreshadowing his loss in the general election.
A dozen years later, when former President George W. Bush was running for re-election, Iowa again declined to hold a presidential nominating contest, as did the South Carolina GOP, so as to avoid any unexpected distractions. Republican insiders speculated that the Iowa Republican Party might forgo its 2020 primary to protect Trump from any uncomfortable or damaging primary challenges that might emerge.
But Kaufmann suggested the state party had more on its mind than simply protecting Trump, even though Kaufmann emphasized that the president enjoys the broad support of Iowa Republicans.
“It’s important to protect the integrity of our caucuses,” Kaufmann said.
The president finished second in Iowa in 2016 to Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and was nearly overtaken in the balloting by third-place finisher, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla.
