Campaign against reality in Iowa
By Olivia Nuzzi
... In a statement to New York, Brad Parscale, the Trump 2020 campaign manager, said, “Our Caucus Day operation is just a preview of what’s to come.” He promised that the campaign would be “the strongest, best funded, and most organized presidential campaign in history.”
... if the campaign’s logistical planning of the Thursday night Des Moines rally was any preview, “most organized” is probably a stretch. Pre-credentialed media was forced to wait outside for over an hour in the 30-degree chill, with staffers periodically emerging from the venue to yell at those waiting to get in, until, without explanation, Secret Service closed off entrance to site altogether.
... Trump’s speech — which .. I watched from the lobby of the Marriott, the hub for many campaigns and news organizations ahead of the caucuses — felt, even more than usual, as though it was geared toward reminding his fans of the 2016 election. There were references to “Crooked Hillary” and “deplorables” and also to his earliest political speeches, with lines cribbed almost directly from his 2015 announcement speech.
This was the scene in a decidedly uncompetitive patch of the heartland as lawmakers in Washington weighed impeachment ...
... Joe Walsh and Bill Weld — and Mark Sanford, the former governor and congressman from South Carolina who briefly campaigned against Trump last year — say that there is little distinction between the Iowa GOP and Trump’s reelection campaign, and that the coordination goes beyond what was considered normal in previous cycles ...
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/01/donald-trumps-iowa-campaign-against-reality.html
