Voting is set to begin Monday night in icy Iowa as former U.S. president Donald Trump eyes a victory that would send a resounding message that neither life-threatening cold nor life-changing legal trouble can slow his march toward the Republican Party’s 2024 nomination.
The Iowa caucuses, which are the opening contest in the months-long Republican presidential primary process, begin at 8 p.m. EST. Caucus participants will gather inside more than 750 schools, churches and community centres to debate their options, in some cases for hours, before casting secret ballots.
While Trump projects confidence, his one-time chief rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, is fighting for his political survival in a make-or-break race for second place. Former UN ambassador Nikki Haley, the only woman in the race, stands in DeSantis’ way. The two have competed aggressively in recent weeks to emerge as the clear alternative to the former president, who has alienated many Americans and could end up being a convicted felon by year’s end.
“With our situation in this country right now, to me, the only candidate is Trump. … He won’t back down,” said 71-year-old Vicki Cannon, of Ankeny, as she waited Monday to hear Donald Trump Jr. campaign on his father’s behalf. “I just feel the only one that can get us out — I’m just sad it’s only going to be for four years — is Trump. Even if people don’t like him because of the way he talks sometimes, you know, he was a good president.”
On the issues, those voting Monday have a greater desire to focus on cultural matters like immigration than the health of the U.S. economy, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of more than 1,500 people who said they planned to take part in Monday’s caucuses in Iowa.
Their message to GOP candidates in this first presidential contest is clear: About 9 in 10 want an upheaval or substantial change in how the U.S. government operates. Many expressed skepticism about the government’s legal system and the integrity of American elections, evidence of the sway that Trump still holds on a sizable share of the Republican Party.
Polls suggest Trump entered Monday with a massive lead in Iowa as Haley and DeSantis dueled for a distant second.
Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and former Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson are also on the ballot in Iowa, as is former New Jersey governor. Chris Christie, who suspended his campaign last week.
With the coldest temperatures in caucus history and dangerous travel conditions in virtually every corner of the state, the campaigns are bracing for a low-turnout contest that will test the strength of their support and their organizational muscle. The final result will serve as a powerful signal for the rest of the nomination fight to determine who will face Democratic President Joe Biden in the November general election.
After Iowa, the Republican primary shifts to New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina over the coming weeks before moving into the rest of the country this spring. The ultimate nominee won’t be confirmed until the party’s national convention in July, but with big wins in the opening contests, Trump will be difficult to stop.
Trump’s political strength heading into the Iowa caucuses, which come 426 days after he launched his 2024 campaign, tells a remarkable story of a Republican Party unwilling or unable to move on from him. He lost to Biden in 2020 after fuelling near-constant chaos while in the White House, culminating with his supporters carrying out a deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol. In total, he faces 91 felony charges across four criminal cases, including two indictments for his efforts to overturn the election and a third indictment for keeping classified documents in his Florida home.
In recent weeks, Trump has increasingly echoed authoritarian leaders and framed his campaign as one of retribution. He has spoken openly about using the power of government to pursue his political enemies. He has repeatedly harnessed rhetoric once used by Adolf Hitler to argue that immigrants entering the U.S. illegally are “poisoning the blood of our country.” And he recently shared a word cloud last week to his social media account highlighting “revenge,” “power” and “dictatorship.”
Trump’s top surrogates played up the stakes Monday.
“I truly believe that God has placed each and every one of us here at this moment, for this moment to save this country,” Arizona Senate candidate Kari Lake told Trump supporters in Fort Dodge.
The final Des Moines Register/NBC News poll before the caucuses found Trump maintaining a formidable lead, supported by nearly half of likely caucusgoers, compared with 20 per cent for Haley and 16 per cent for DeSantis, who are in a close battle for second. Trump is also viewed more favourably than the other top contenders by likely caucusgoers, at 69 per cent compared with 58 per cent for DeSantis and 48 per cent for Haley.
More than 1,000 miles to the east, Biden’s campaign sought to signal strength from its Delaware headquarters.
The Democratic president’s team announced early Monday that he and the Democratic National Committee raised more than US$97 million in the last quarter of 2023 and finished the year with US$117 million in the bank. His team wants to offer a stark contrast between the two parties: While Biden is flush with cash entering 2024, facing token opposition in the Democratic primary, the Republican field has spent more than US$90 million on Iowa advertising alone, much of it designed to attack each other.
Meanwhile, Trump used his Truth Social site early Monday to knock Haley. Her campaign answered that Trump’s diatribes, some of them contradictory, prove he considers her a threat.
Haley began the day in central Iowa by encouraging some of her caucus precinct captains to “speak from the heart” as they make their statements on her behalf before votes are cast.
Trump predicted he would set a modern-day Republican caucus record with a margin-of-victory exceeding the nearly 13-percentage-point victory that Bob Dole earned in 1988. Still, he played down expectations that he would eclipse 50 per cent, preempting any criticism that a majority of Republican voters might prefer someone else.
The temperature in parts of Iowa on Monday could dip as low as -14 F (-26 C) while snowdrifts from Friday’s blizzard still make travel hazardous across the state.
Forecasters warned that “dangerously cold wind chills” as low as 45 degrees below 0 F were possible through noon Tuesday. The conditions, according to the National Weather Service, could lead to “frostbite and hypothermia in a matter of minutes if not properly dressed for the conditions.”
The winter weather, intimidating even for Iowa, will make an already unrepresentative process even less representative. Only a tiny portion of the participants will be voters of color, given Iowa’s overwhelmingly white population, a fact that helped persuade Democrats to shift their opening primary contest to South Carolina this year.
Iowa’s caucuses are also playing out on Martin Luther King Day, a federal holiday.
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Peoples reported from Washington. Beaumont reported from Indianola, Iowa, and Fingerhut reported from Fort Dodge, Iowa. Associated Press writers Jill Colvin in Des Moines, Iowa, Adriana Gomez Licon in Council Bluffs, Iowa, and Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed to this report.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston says it’s “disgraceful and demeaning” that a Halifax-area school would request that service members not wear military uniforms to its Remembrance Day ceremony.
Houston’s comments were part of a chorus of criticism levelled at the school — Sackville Heights Elementary — whose administration decided to back away from the plan after the outcry.
A November newsletter from the school in Middle Sackville, N.S., invited Armed Forces members to attend its ceremony but asked that all attendees arrive in civilian attire to “maintain a welcoming environment for all.”
Houston, who is currently running for re-election, accused the school’s leaders of “disgracing themselves while demeaning the people who protect our country” in a post on the social media platform X Thursday night.
“If the people behind this decision had a shred of the courage that our veterans have, this cowardly and insulting idea would have been rejected immediately,” Houston’s post read. There were also several calls for resignations within the school’s administration attached to Houston’s post.
In an email to families Thursday night, the school’s principal, Rachael Webster, apologized and welcomed military family members to attend “in the attire that makes them most comfortable.”
“I recognize this request has caused harm and I am deeply sorry,” Webster’s email read, adding later that the school has the “utmost respect for what the uniform represents.”
Webster said the initial request was out of concern for some students who come from countries experiencing conflict and who she said expressed discomfort with images of war, including military uniforms.
Her email said any students who have concerns about seeing Armed Forces members in uniform can be accommodated in a way that makes them feel safe, but she provided no further details in the message.
Webster did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
At a news conference Friday, Houston said he’s glad the initial request was reversed but said he is still concerned.
“I can’t actually fathom how a decision like that was made,” Houston told reporters Friday, adding that he grew up moving between military bases around the country while his father was in the Armed Forces.
“My story of growing up in a military family is not unique in our province. The tradition of service is something so many of us share,” he said.
“Saying ‘lest we forget’ is a solemn promise to the fallen. It’s our commitment to those that continue to serve and our commitment that we will pass on our respects to the next generation.”
Liberal Leader Zach Churchill also said he’s happy with the school’s decision to allow uniformed Armed Forces members to attend the ceremony, but he said he didn’t think it was fair to question the intentions of those behind the original decision.
“We need to have them (uniforms) on display at Remembrance Day,” he said. “Not only are we celebrating (veterans) … we’re also commemorating our dead who gave the greatest sacrifice for our country and for the freedoms we have.”
NDP Leader Claudia Chender said that while Remembrance Day is an important occasion to honour veterans and current service members’ sacrifices, she said she hopes Houston wasn’t taking advantage of the decision to “play politics with this solemn occasion for his own political gain.”
“I hope Tim Houston reached out to the principal of the school before making a public statement,” she said in a statement.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
REGINA – Saskatchewan Opposition NDP Leader Carla Beck says she wants to prove to residents her party is the government in waiting as she heads into the incoming legislative session.
Beck held her first caucus meeting with 27 members, nearly double than what she had before the Oct. 28 election but short of the 31 required to form a majority in the 61-seat legislature.
She says her priorities will be health care and cost-of-living issues.
Beck says people need affordability help right now and will press Premier Scott Moe’s Saskatchewan Party government to cut the gas tax and the provincial sales tax on children’s clothing and some grocery items.
Beck’s NDP is Saskatchewan’s largest Opposition in nearly two decades after sweeping Regina and winning all but one seat in Saskatoon.
The Saskatchewan Party won 34 seats, retaining its hold on all of the rural ridings and smaller cities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia‘s growing population was the subject of debate on Day 12 of the provincial election campaign, with Liberal Leader Zach Churchill arguing immigration levels must be reduced until the province can provide enough housing and health-care services.
Churchill said Thursday a plan by the incumbent Progressive Conservatives to double the province’s population to two million people by the year 2060 is unrealistic and unsustainable.
“That’s a big leap and it’s making life harder for people who live here, (including ) young people looking for a place to live and seniors looking to downsize,” he told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
Anticipating that his call for less immigration might provoke protests from the immigrant community, Churchill was careful to note that he is among the third generation of a family that moved to Nova Scotia from Lebanon.
“I know the value of immigration, the importance of it to our province. We have been built on the backs of an immigrant population. But we just need to do it in a responsible way.”
The Liberal leader said Tim Houston’s Tories, who are seeking a second term in office, have made a mistake by exceeding immigration targets set by the province’s Department of Labour and Immigration. Churchill said a Liberal government would abide by the department’s targets.
In the most recent fiscal year, the government welcomed almost 12,000 immigrants through its nominee program, exceeding the department’s limit by more than 4,000, he said. The numbers aren’t huge, but the increase won’t help ease the province’s shortages in housing and doctors, and the increased strain on its infrastructure, including roads, schools and cellphone networks, Churchill said.
“(The Immigration Department) has done the hard work on this,” he said. “They know where the labour gaps are, and they know what growth is sustainable.”
In response, Houston said his commitment to double the population was a “stretch goal.” And he said the province had long struggled with a declining population before that trend was recently reversed.
“The only immigration that can come into this province at this time is if they are a skilled trade worker or a health-care worker,” Houston said. “The population has grown by two per cent a year, actually quite similar growth to what we experienced under the Liberal government before us.”
Still, Houston said he’s heard Nova Scotians’ concerns about population growth, and he then pivoted to criticize Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for trying to send 6,000 asylum seekers to Nova Scotia, an assertion the federal government has denied.
Churchill said Houston’s claim about asylum seekers was shameful.
“It’s smoke and mirrors,” the Liberal leader said. “He is overshooting his own department’s numbers for sustainable population growth and yet he is trying to blame this on asylum seekers … who aren’t even here.”
In September, federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller said there is no plan to send any asylum seekers to the province without compensation or the consent of the premier. He said the 6,000 number was an “aspirational” figure based on models that reflect each province’s population.
In Halifax, NDP Leader Claudia Chender said it’s clear Nova Scotia needs more doctors, nurses and skilled trades people.
“Immigration has been and always will be a part of the Nova Scotia story, but we need to build as we grow,” Chender said. “This is why we have been pushing the Houston government to build more affordable housing.”
Chender was in a Halifax cafe on Thursday when she promised her party would remove the province’s portion of the harmonized sales tax from all grocery, cellphone and internet bills if elected to govern on Nov. 26. The tax would also be removed from the sale and installation of heat pumps.
“Our focus is on helping people to afford their lives,” Chender told reporters. “We know there are certain things that you can’t live without: food, internet and a phone …. So we know this will have the single biggest impact.”
The party estimates the measure would save the average Nova Scotia family about $1,300 a year.
“That’s a lot more than a one or two per cent HST cut,” Chender said, referring to the Progressive Conservative pledge to reduce the tax by one percentage point and the Liberal promise to trim it by two percentage points.
Elsewhere on the campaign trail, Houston announced that a Progressive Conservative government would make parking free at all Nova Scotia hospitals and health-care centres. The promise was also made by the Liberals in their election platform released Monday.
“Free parking may not seem like a big deal to some, but … the parking, especially for people working at the facilities, can add up to hundreds of dollars,” the premier told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
