(Washington) Donald Trump, losing speed in the polls, is going to Iowa on Tuesday to talk about the economy, but his message is already confused by the political storm surrounding the immigration police (ICE).
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The American president “will visit a local business and give a speech on the economy and the cost of living,” his spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said Monday during a press conference.
But the subject was raised only briefly and almost all the questions focused on the death in Minneapolis, Minnesota, of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old nurse shot and killed by federal agents during a protest against ICE. His death sparked great outrage.
Iowa (Central), now a conservative stronghold, is famous in the United States for being the state that launches the primaries. During the 2024 presidential election, Donald Trump largely won against Democrat Kamala Harris.
But since this victory, the tide has turned.
Corn and biofuel producers in Iowa, two essential economic sectors for this rural state, asked Donald Trump in an open letter to act “immediately” to revive demand, claiming to have reached a “breaking point”.
Across the country, unfavorable polls follow one another for the 79-year-old Republican.
He campaigned on two big promises: to revive purchasing power and to expel illegal immigrants en masse.
On these two aspects, a majority of Americans now say they are dissatisfied with its action – even if, in the case of immigration, it is more the methods than the objective stated by the government which are criticized.
“Shutdown”
Feeling the tide turning against ICE, the White House has been trying since Monday to play appeasement while defending, in substance, its policy of mass expulsions.
Karoline Leavitt described the death of the nurse in Minneapolis as a “tragedy”, a very different tone from the attacks made by the Trump administration against Renee Good, the American shot and killed by an immigration police officer in early January, already in Minneapolis.
Some of the thousands of agents deployed by the American president in this Democratic city must begin to leave on Tuesday and speculation is rife about a dismissal of the Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem.
PHOTO NATHAN HOWARD, REUTERS ARCHIVES
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem
The Democrats are now determined to prevent the president from financing his fight against immigration, which poses the risk of a new budgetary paralysis, this after Donald Trump was already confronted in October with the longest budgetary paralysis in the history of the United States.
Republicans therefore see the midterm elections approaching with concern, which could cost the president control of Congress.
What will be crucial during this election, traditionally difficult for the party that controls the White House, “is the motivation” of voters, Lonna Atkeson, political scientist at Florida State University, explains to AFP.
“Republicans will not be very motivated to leave their homes and support Republican candidates (…). But Democrats are motivated to show their anger,” she explains.
