Third in a series interpreting the results of Iowa’s 2024 state and federal elections.
Ed Tibbetts, a longtime reporter and editor in the Quad-Cities, is the publisher of the Along the Mississippi newsletter, where this article first appeared. Find more of his work at edtibbetts.substack.com.
Donald Trump’s mastery of Iowa in the 2024 election is no more apparent than his performance in a batch of counties that border the Mississippi River.
For the last eight years, this region has been clearly in Trump’s corner. But it shifted even more decisively in his favor Tuesday.
Trump won these ten counties by more than 34,000 votes, according to unofficial results.
There were still a small number of ballots to be counted, but Trump’s victory in this region approached Barack Obama’s historic wins in 2012, at least in numeric terms. And, compared to four years ago, Trump won this stretch of Iowa by more than double the number of votes than he did against Joe Biden.
That’s no small shift.
Political pros have told me over the years that if Iowa is ever to go to the Democrats again, it must win these counties—and by sizable margins. But right now, those sizable margins are all in the Republicans’ favor.
Trump even won Scott County, the biggest urban area along the river, by 3,499 votes (45,947 to 42,448, or 51.0 percent to 47.1 percent), according to the local auditor’s office. Scott County hasn’t voted for a Republican for president since Ronald Reagan in 1984. And it was the only county on the river that had been holding out against the shift to Trump.
I have described Scott County as a bastion of purple in a sea of red. Obviously, I’m going to have to think about whether that characterization is still accurate. It’s true in the first district Congressional race, Democrat Christina Bohannan was able to win the county over Mariannette Miller-Meeks but by a smaller margin than Rita Hart did four years ago.
Biden also won the county four years ago, but Trump was the victor Tuesday.
It’s an old story that these counties along the Mississippi River, like other Obama-Trump counties throughout the Midwest—characterized by a greater share of white working class, non-college educated, voters—have swung to the right. But it is Trump’s margin of victory Tuesday over Kamala Harris that is the most notable.
Joe Biden continued to lose ground along the river (although not in Scott County) while losing to Trump statewide by about eight percentage points in the 2020 election. But this year, Trump’s winning margins, again in terms of raw votes, exploded on the way to a 13-percentage point victory statewide.
That’s an extraordinary win by any measure, and it is a bitter disappointment to those who were given a glimmer of hope by that last-minute Iowa Poll that said Harris was actually winning.
As I write this, I’m listening to cable news analysts dissecting what Trump did right and what Harris and the Democrats did wrong.
I’ve always cautioned against believing the instant judgments from people who got very little sleep the night before. I do the same now. In the immediate aftermath of an election, rarely is clarity in ample supply.
Still, the decisiveness of Trump’s victory cannot be disputed. When he loses by only five points in New Jersey, that’s an extraordinary turnabout. Biden defeated him there by nearly 16 percentage points in 2020.
Democrats will now have to pick themselves up and figure out what to do next. Just like the Republican Party did after Obama’s re-election in 2012.
I have made no secret that I believe Donald Trump is unfit for the presidency. I have not changed my mind. I doubt many on the left have, either.
Obviously, not enough Americans agreed.
Donald Trump will be inaugurated in two months, and only then will we begin to find out whether the very real fears—chaos, retribution, mass deportations, across-the-board tariffs, etc.—that drove Democrats and (not enough) Republicans to oppose him will come to fruition.
The day after an election is when the losing side is bound to feel its most despondent. There is plenty of that today on the left. But it’s important to remember after elections end, governing soon begins.
That is why we hold elections: To choose the people who will lead our government.
On Tuesday, America chose. But our choice of individuals to hold these positions of power doesn’t have to determine our country’s destiny. And if there is one thing people on the left, both inside and outside of the government, should learn from the Republican Party, it’s that losing an election doesn’t mean surrendering when it comes to governing. It means continuing to work to enact the policies that will make America a more prosperous, just nation.
5 Comments
two cents that explain the red wave
$0.01: Democrats have not selected their candidate in primaries since 2016. In 2020, they hid their preferred candidate in a basement, and people had to chose based on tv ads. In 2024, they sabotaged the Iowa caucus, proposed the same old candidate, ousted him with a coup, and asked us to vote for a poor ticket that had not been vetted in primaries. We the people deserve a democratic process, especially those who call themselves democrat.
$0.01 People have common sense. Like, some people like guns, free speech, and human fetuses, so they call themselves Republicans, and it easy to explain to others. I have yet to find someone who wants their child daughters to see the pen*s of a man who identifies as a woman in their locker room; who thinks it is great that 50% of middle schoolers have been brainwashed to believe they are gender-fluid or transgenders; or who will tolerate similar restrictions on their speech as in the 1980 Soviet Union.
This is why we got a red wave, and this is why the DNC sould renew some of their members.
Karl M Fri 8 Nov 9:51 AM
another cent
$0.01 Democrats are worried that tariffs will be more dangerous than a nuclear war with Moscow. Consider your simple morning coffee and the US coffee industry, from Starbucks to US coffee machine manufacturers. This holiday season, you can buy a fancy Breville espresso machine to enlighten your kitchen counters. This US company manufactures beautiful machines in Shenzen, a Chinese city. The sales price is about $1000. With tariffs, we can give jobs to the cousins of JD Vance and produce a cheaper better coffee machine here in the US, so that the $1000 does not fund another COVID epidemic.
Karl M Fri 8 Nov 10:01 AM
red sea of change
Good article! As the election postmortem continues I remember attending the Scott County Dems convention back in 1984 as a John Glenn delegate. Not sure there would be a place in today’s Democrat party for him as moderates like RFK Jr, Tulsi Gabbard, and Joe Manchin have fled the nest. Bohannan will likely run again as she was close but no cigar. We will endure yet another two years of no Iowa Democrats in congress and Terrace Hill is currently a pipe dream. Would like to see the Iowa Caucus return as we need to right the ship. Party went far left and needs a return to normalcy. Harris would have lost even with Shapiro as her #2 as Trump had an electoral landslide and didn’t need Pennsylvania after all. Walz was a cringe worthy VP selection. An odd one to say the very least.
ModerateDem Fri 8 Nov 10:44 AM
2024 election
1. In north Ankeny precinct our 2020 caucus of several hundred voters went smoothly. The young man who chaired the session (held in the Methodist’s Family Center) had planned ahead, recruited volunteers, and, importantly, learned to use the app. My wife and I attended meetups with most all candidates, always a thrill. Kamala had been at DMACC for a meetup in fall 2019, so had heard her speak. My wife stood for Joe, me for Elizabeth. Pete won, as I recall. This to say the Caucuses are great if used to organize and educate.
2. The 2016 caucus was a mess owing to many Bernie folks needing to register and separately to register for attendance, and delegate count was haphazard, so Bernie was pissed and, even though not a D, got needed changes for 2024. He clearly had tapped into new voters who left caucus frustrated and probably not counted. Room too small. Not planned for hoard of new voters.
3. In 2020, we know the app proved too complicated for many precinct captains (who didn’t read the memo) and who preferred to call in, which the Party hadn’t planned for, so a big mess. Iowa got a black eye. We participated in the 2024 “caucus” which (even though we love Joe) seemed rigged, and we both recalled he’d said he was a “bridge” not a highway, so surprised he was running in 2024. We both grew to love Kamala and were buoyed by convention, her TKO of Trump at the debate, and rallies which did not (to me) reveal the angst amongst the general populace.
4. We both thought Kamala would have been a great president and a steel wall against MAGA, but a mixed race woman who could talk circles around Trump probably never was in the cards and, for sure, not Hispanics and black men. As I’m looking at the early count, about 14 million fewer voted for Kamala in 2024 than for Joe in 2020.
5. As Karl M says, the defense of culture war issues has proved tough in Iowa. In MO the ballot issue to affirm abortion passed by simple majority, yet the state went solid blue except KC, St Louis and capital area. FL voters went for similar ballot issue by simple majority but a super majority was required, and the state was bright red.
6. The bet on Tim Walz seemed right at the time. Recall that Fetterman won in PA in 22.. An odd duck recovering from a stroke that almost disconnected his brain from his tongue.
Gerald Ott Sat 9 Nov 11:20 AM
MO =
Mo solid red. Got colors mixed
Gerald Ott Sat 9 Nov 11:24 AM