Ted Cruz Fights Historic Battle After Winning Iowa Caucus

Since Iowa, no one is talking about Donald Trump.

Donald Trump said he’s proud of his second-place finish in the Republican presidential caucuses in Iowa but skipping the Fox News debate and his inexperience with mobilizing voters on the ground hurt his campaign. Marco Rubio, who placed a close third. “Nice.” Cruz received 27.6% of the Republican vote, Trump 24.3% and Rubio 23.1%.

“We’re in this for the long haul”, Sanders told reporters as he arrived in New Hampshire where polls put him as a strong favorite.

CBS News reported that Iowa was in fact Trump’s biggest investment so far in the race, with an Iowa campaign staff larger than that of most presidential candidates. Cruz’s campaign, including Iowa Representative Steve King, interpreted that to mean Carson was dropping out.

New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary will be held on February 9.

Needless to say, holding the Iowa caucuses for a second time seems rather unlikely, but these latest broadsides should only intensify the increasingly contentious battle between Trump and Cruz.

Mr Trump also accused Mr Cruz’s team on Twitter of sending out a flyer created to look like an official electoral document to scare Iowa voters into turning out at the caucuses. “You know why? I raised $6M for vets in one hour” by counterprogramming the debate, he reminded. First is momentum: whether Rubio and Cruz can maintain it, and whether Trump can regain it. Second is who will attract the GOP voters who support the floundering candidates as they quit or become obvious no-hopers but refuse to quit.

Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate said he would forward voter fraud allegations to the Iowa GOP, which runs the caucuses (and hasn’t issued any sort of statement about the situation).

“Nobody is going to believe that”, Limbaugh said, “especially when you offer that criticism sounding as though it could come with Bernie Sanders”.

But Trump didn’t stop there as he leveled other claims against Cruz, including that the Texas senator falsely suggested he supported Obamacare.