On Saturday, former President Donald Trump will head to the Iowa State Fair with nine members of the Florida Congressional delegation who have endorsed him over Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Representatives Byron Donalds, Matt Gaetz, Cory Mills, Anna Paulina Luna, Greg Steube, Gus Bilirakis, Carlos Gimenez, Brian Mast, and Mike Waltz will all accompany Trump throughout the day.
The Trump campaign intends to deliver a message to Iowa voters that even in DeSantis’s home state of Florida, Republican leaders prefer Trump to DeSantis for the Republican presidential nomination. Ron DeSantis will also be in attendance at the Iowa State Fair on Saturday.
One stop President Trump will not be making is Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds’s ‘fire side chat’ event with various Republican presidential candidates. Reynolds has come under increasing criticism from Trump for her displays of public favoritism towards Ron DeSantis despite a long standing tradition of Iowa’s Republican governors remaining neutral in Republican presidential primary contests in the state. Reynolds has insisted she will not endorse a candidate during the primary, but has publicly fawned over DeSantis for months, leading to him floating her as a Vice Presidential pick in front of a crowd of tens.
An additional event to keep an-eye-on on Saturday will be the Iowa State Fair Straw Poll. The Iowa Secretary of State will be conducting an unofficial straw poll of fair-goers – the event being a semi-replacement for the defunct Iowa Straw Poll last held in Ames Iowa in 2011.