THE IOWA QUESTION
Once Reliably Blue, Clinton County, Iowa Swung from Obama to Trump In 2016:
Can the Democrats Win It Back In 2020 and Which Candidate Is Best Positioned to Do So?
2016 was an unmitigated disaster for Democrats in Iowa. Donald Trump trounced Hillary Clinton by 9.5% as many farmers and blue-collar workers turned on the Democrats. Nowhere was this shellacking more emblematic than in Clinton County. Barack Obama had carried Clinton County with vote totals of 60.6% and 60.8% in 2012 and 2008 respectively. Donald Trump, however, carried Clinton County 48.9% to 43.8% over Hillary Clinton in 2016. Once reliable Democrat voters had suddenly fled the party seemingly overnight. It is these very same voters that Democrats must win back in order to flip the State of Iowa blue in 2020. The epicenter of these voters happens to reside in the ironically named City of Clinton, Iowa.
Clinton, Iowa, the County Seat of Clinton County, is a heavily industrial town that straddles the Mississippi River. The City has seen its population decline from 34,719 in 1970 to just 26,885 according to the 2010 census. Evidence of this decline is present throughout the entire city. Abandoned homes, dollar stores, decrepit factories and strong odors from those facilities permeate through the town. The city of Clinton mirrors the demographics of Iowa as a whole. The state of Iowa is about 90.7% white and only 4.0% percent African American. Clinton meanwhile is 88.9% white and 4.65% black. Put simply, how Clinton, Iowa goes so will the rest of Iowa.
Clinton County, as it did in 2016, was a near mirror image of the state of Iowa as a whole in 2018. Two years after losing the county by five percent, Democratic Gubernatorial candidate Fred Hubbell produced a 1% margin of victory in Clinton County over incumbent Republican Governor Kim Reynolds. Incumbent Representative Dave Loebsack (D- 3rd District) further outpaced Hubbell by receiving 56% of the vote in Clinton County on the way to his reelection.
Buoyed by anti-Trump sentiment Democrats flipped two of the three Republican-held Congressional seats in Iowa. Donald Trump’s extremely unpopular tariff policies also nearly led to the defeat of Reynolds as she only defeated Hubbell by a 50.3% to 47.5% margin. Winning Clinton/Clinton County is mandatory for the Democrats as the region represents nearly a perfect bellwether for the state of Iowa. The policies that are popular in Clinton are almost certain to resonate in the rest of the state due to the mirror image demographics. Picking the right policies to appeal to Clinton County is imperative for victory and Democrats must absolutely hit a home run in this department.
Democrats must continue to appeal to the anger felt by many Iowans over Donald Trump’s tariffs. Pork producers in particular have been hit hardest by retaliatory tariffs and are fearful for their futures. To save face from his damaging tariffs Donald Trump proposed a bail out for Iowa farmers to the tune of 16 to 20 billion dollars in aid. Iowans, are proud folks and hardly enjoy being bailed out due to the incompetence of the Trump Administration. A Democrat position of disavowing the trade wars between the U.S. and China would be a good first step towards winning Clinton voters.
Democrats must further appeal to the union roots of industrial cities like Clinton. A strong pro-union, health care and wage growth message will go a long way in winning back previously lost support. The Democrat candidate also must take care not to engage in any cultural wars in this part of the state. Instead the Democrats must stay laser focused on the economic messages that brought them to their House victories in 2018.
If Democrats can stay focused on an economic message that promotes wage growth, health care and ending the trade war, then they will have the potential to bring back the voters they lost in 2016. The 2018 Midterms showed that it was indeed possible to convince Iowa voters to come back home to the Democratic party. It is imperative that the Democrats focus especially on the voters in and surrounding Clinton County. These voters have historically voted Democrat and will be easier to have vote blue than voters in the western portion of the state which are traditionally Republican.
Whichever Democratic candidate can best appeal to Clinton County, will likely be the candidate best suited to take on Donald Trump in the general election. Democratic voters who are picking a candidate simply based off who is most electable should follow Clinton County’s lead. The City and County are demographically similar to the areas in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan that swung heavily against the Democrats in 2016. Voters in these areas have historically voted Democrat and it is imperative that the 2020 Democratic candidates dish out policies and ideas that directly appeal to them.
There are five heavy hitting Democrats still in contention in Iowa. They are Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar. In coming articles, I will individually preview these five candidates and outline why each of them can or cannot win the Iowa Caucus. Four of the five contenders have policies and visions for the U.S. that are well suited for Iowa. My first candidate profile will outline why Joe Biden is the only one of the five whose policies and vision are an ill fit for the Iowa Caucus.