Trump wins Union County

Jan. 15—The 2024 Iowa caucuses maybe remembered for its below 0 temperatures and piles of snow across much of the state. The conditions in Union County were no different, but it didn't keep people away from the Republican side of the event in Creston.

"This is twice the amount of people I figured," said Union County Republican Chairman Mike Lang said from Creston High School, one of the two county sites for the Republican Party. The other site was in Afton. Concerns were the bitter winter weather would keep people from attending.

Both locations combined to give former President Donald Trump the win in Union County.

Both Afton and Creston also saw activity at the county level. In Creston, Union County Sheriff Mark Shepherd announced his retirement at the end of his term as the position is on the November ballot. He is in the last year of the term. His career in law enforcement started in 1997.

"I want to leave it in a better place than I found it," he told the audience at Creston High.

Former Union County Sheriff deputy Brian Bolton announced his candidacy at Creston to replace Shepherd. A Union County native, Bolton was in the department from 2002 to 2012 and now is part of the First Responder Taskforce where he helps find life insurance for all first responders. He is also a volunteer for Iowa Concern of Police Survivors to assist with funerals for police officers.

He said he was asked about his interest in running for sheriff.

"Do what is right and serve others," he said about his philosophy. "You and your family should be kept safe. Union County is a wonderful place to call home. Let's keep it that way," he said.

Union County Supervisor Dennis Hopkins spoke in support of fellow supervisors' re-election campaigns for Rick Friday and Dennis Brown, both who were in attendance

Brian Bolton announces his candidacy for Union County Sheriff Monday at the Republican caucus precinct at Creston High School. Sheriff Mark Shepherd said he will retire at the end of the term that ends this year.

in Afton. Hopkins was elected to the board in 2022.

For presidential nominations, Trump won Union County with 182. He was followed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis with 76; Nikki Haley, 33; Vivek Ramaswamy, 19, and Ryan Binkley, 7. Chris Christie was also on the ballot but did not receive votes. He ended his campaign last week. County Republican officials said results from the Lorimor precinct were not available but speculated they would not change the outcomes.

Trump decisively won Union County and Iowa with his closest rivals languishing far behind, a crucial victory that reinforces the former president's grip on his party at the outset of the GOP's 2024 nomination fight.

It was not immediately clear who would emerge as the second-place finisher, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis or former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley. Caucus voters endured cold and dangerous driving conditions to participate in meetings that unfolded in hundreds of schools, churches and community centers across the state.

The results are just the first in what will be a monthslong effort for Trump to secure the GOP nomination a third consecutive time. But the victory sends an unmistakable message to the Republican Party that the nomination is Trump's to lose and crystalizes the challenge facing his GOP opponents.

Trump was already looking ahead to a potential general election matchup against President Joe Biden as he addressed hundreds of cheering supporters at a caucus site at the Horizon Events Center in Clive.

"He is totally destroying our country," Trump said of Biden. "We were a great nation three years ago and today people are laughing at us."

Biden's team, meanwhile, announced that he and the Democratic National Committee raised more than $97 million in the last quarter of 2023 and finished the year with $117 million in the bank, an effort to demonstrate how Biden is preparing for a possible rematch while Trump is competing in the primary.

DeSantis and Haley are competing to emerge as the top alternative to the former president. Haley hopes to compete vigorously in New Hampshire, where she hopes to be more successful with the state's independent voters heading into the Jan. 23 primary. DeSantis is heading to New Hampshire on Tuesday only after a stop in South Carolina, a conservative stronghold where the Feb. 24 contest could prove pivotal.

Before she left, Haley offered a subtle jab at Trump while addressing voters at a same caucus site.

"If you want to move forward with no more vendettas, if you want to move forward with a sense of hope, join us in this caucus," she said. "I ask for your vote. And I promise you I will make sure every day I focus on what it takes to make you proud."

Several hundred people rose to their feet in applause.

Trump, meanwhile, was expected to fly to New York Monday night so he could be in court Tuesday as a jury is poised to consider whether he should pay additional damages to a columnist who last year won a $5 million jury award against Trump for sex abuse and defamation.

He will then fly to New Hampshire, the next state in the Republican primary calendar, to hold a rally Tuesday evening.

Iowa is an uneven predictor of who will ultimately lead Republicans into the general election. George W. Bush's 2000 victory was the last time a Republican candidate won in Iowa and went on to become the party's standard-bearer.

Trump showed significant strength among Iowa's urban, small-town and rural communities, according to AP VoteCast. He also performed well with evangelical Christians and those without a college degree. And a majority of caucusgoers said that they identify with Trump's "Make America Great Again" movement.

One relative weakness for Trump comes in the suburbs, where only about 4 in 10 supported him.

AP VoteCast is a survey of more than 1,500 voters who said they planned to take part in the caucuses. The survey is conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson were also on the ballot in Iowa, as was former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who suspended his campaign last week.

Trump's success tells a remarkable story of a Republican Party unwilling or unable to move on from a flawed front-runner. He lost to Biden in 2020 after fueling 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.

The U.S. Supreme Court is weighing whether states have the ability to block Trump from the ballot for his role in sparking the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. And he's facing criminal trials in Washington and Atlanta for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

Associated Press contributed to this story.