Canceled flights, snowy roads, postponed campaign events… A winter storm caused chaos in the US state of Iowa on Friday, January 12th, three days before the first Republican caucus of the year.
The major primary elections are set to begin in this Midwestern state on January 15, with Donald Trump the heavy favorite…as long as voters can travel to vote. Because the entire state is affected by a cold wave that the American authorities themselves describe as “dangerous”.
In the capital, Des Moines, where snow fell all day, few vehicles took their chances on the slippery roads. Dozens of cars and trucks were overturned on the road. Wind gusts of more than 50 km/h are forecast overnight and in the next few days the temperature is expected to drop by a further ten to twenty degrees at −9°C.
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Most flights carrying thousands of journalists, activists and campaign workers to the first major gathering of the American presidential election have been canceled or diverted to neighboring states.
Trump wants everything done to “make voting easier”
How can one campaign under these conditions? The question concerns Republican candidates who are forced to cancel or postpone their events. Among them, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley preferred to broadcast all of her locally scheduled meetings online.
“We're not afraid of snow,” said Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who made a detour to his campaign headquarters in the early afternoon because he couldn't go to the voters' meeting.
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The forty-year-old, currently third in the Republican polls, is still hoping to narrow the dizzying lead of favorite Donald Trump.
The former president also has to deal with the chaos caused by the storm: several of his meetings were canceled across the state on Saturday. The billionaire has been criminally charged four times and is counting on a landslide victory in Iowa to quickly be named the Republican nominee against Joe Biden in November. Those around him are calling on the local authorities to do everything they can to “facilitate the voting process on Monday evening.”
The storm is expected to intensify
Outside Iowa, much of the country has been hit in recent days by heavy rain and snow caused by a winter storm that left several deaths and left hundreds of thousands of homes without power. “Every state is under a yellow, orange or red alert,” warned the National Weather Service NWS on X.
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The storm is expected to strengthen across the country, with snow in the Midwest and severe thunderstorms in the South.
An airport in Chicago, Illinois, was closed Friday morning due to snow and ice, and hundreds of flights across the region were canceled.
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