Final push in Iowa: Hinson, Lahn rejoin Trump in Dubuque | Iowa Campaigns and Elections

DUBUQUE — President Donald Trump is closing out the final days of a turbulent midterm campaign with rallies in two states he has handily won in the past while Democrats began to fracture in Michigan, risking their effort to retake the Senate.

The president was on his way to Salina, Kansas, after speaking for two hours Sunday in Dubuque. Republicans in both states are fending off robust challenges from Democrats, threatening GOP majorities in the Senate while they’re already at risk in the House.

But in Iowa, Trump insisted Republicans were on the verge of sweeping victories on Election Day on Tuesday.

“We’re going to elect ‘America first’ Republicans up and down the line,” he said.

With more than 54 million votes already cast, the trips reflect the GOP’s defensive posture as the elections become a referendum on Trump’s White House second term.

They are a reminder of how starkly the political environment has changed since Trump’s last campaign. In 2024, he worked to flip states that had previously backed Democrat Joe Biden in 2020. This year, Trump has focused largely on states he has dominated before as voters, including previous supporters, question the economic fallout of his decision to impose tariffs and launch the war in Iran.

Infighting in Michigan

But Democrats who have become increasingly bullish on their prospects were confronting challenges of their own.

In Michigan, Democrat Abdul El-Sayed’s onetime opponent in the Senate primary, Haley Stevens, appeared with Republican Mike Rogers at a church service and later endorsed his campaign. Stevens, a congresswoman who has criticized El-Sayed as being insufficiently supportive of Israel, said she backed Rogers after an invitation to a Democratic event was rescinded.

“Our Democratic nominee for Senate said I was no longer welcome in his campaign and that I should stay away,” Stevens said in a video announcing the endorsement. “And he’s right. And that’s why I am endorsing Mike Rogers for the United States Senate today.”

President Donald Trump told rallygoers in Iowa that Democrat Haley Stevens “was very brave” to cross the aisle and endorse a Republican in Michigan’s Senate race.

“I don’t know Haley. I’ve never met Haley. But Haley said what few people were willing to say,” Trump said Sunday. “I’d love her to join the Republican Party actually.”

Hinson ‘in perfect shape’

President Donald Trump continued his commentary on the appearance of Republican candidates, this time saying Iowa’s GOP Senate candidate, Ashley Hinson, “put herself in shape” without using GLP-1 drugs.

“I knew Ashley for a long time, and she was a little bit heavier,” Trump said. “She knew what she was doing, she knew the weight that was on her. Really, literally the weight, and she knew the importance of what she was doing. And she went out — the old fashioned way too, not with ‘give me a shot.’”

After being interrupted by a protester, he continued.

“She went on a regimen, she put herself in shape,” Trump said. “She’s in perfect shape. She was great the other way. But she put herself in shape, and she did that for you.”

He contrasted her weight loss with his own experience, saying, “Me, I put on a couple of pounds.”

Test of Trump’s strength

The campaign’s closing stretch has largely become a test of Trump’s enduring strength in a Republican Party he reshaped in his image a decade ago. He’s hoping to energize voters like Jon Lutz.

Lutz said he’s happy with Trump’s second term record and wants Republicans to keep control of the House and Senate so his agenda will advance.

Lutz said Trump has already accomplished so much in the first two years of his second term, and he wants to see Republicans keep control of both the House and Senate to allow his agenda to continue.

“He’s done what he’s said he’s going to do,” the 60-year-old civil engineer said. “I want him to keep going.”

Wendy Kuenzler was also seeing Trump for the first time on Sunday. Waiting in line at the concession stand, the 44-year-old from Burlington said she felt that Iowa was at a crossroads with multiple competitive elections. She plans to support Ashley Hinson, the U.S. Senate nominee.

Kuenzler said she doesn’t blame rising gas and grocery prices on Trump. “He’s on the path to correcting it,” she said.

Democrats in Iowa were also campaigning feverishly on Sunday. Rob Sand, the nominee for governor, was holding several events across the state.

Trump is betting that he can overcome the headwinds facing Republicans this year by relentlessly appearing before his most loyal supporters. But the more than two dozen rallies he held in October were occasionally overshadowed by Trump’s meandering asides and sometimes graphic descriptions of the physique of the male politicians he was supporting.

Trump paused the rallies on Saturday and spent the evening at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida at a jungle-themed Halloween party, where he bragged about the wealth of his guests and dismissed concerns about the country’s direction.

“The country has never done better,” he said.

Outgoing Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., raised concerns on Sunday that the president’s policies, particularly tariffs, could weigh down the GOP.

“Tariffs are not popular here in the Midwest,” he told CNN’s “State of the Union.” “I tried telling the president that.”

Bacon predicted “there will be a debate in the party” about its future if there are significant losses this week.

Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina was more optimistic. The chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee said he was confident Republicans would keep the Senate and embraced Trump’s role in the campaign.

“There’s no doubt that President Trump has said himself that the midterm election is about him,” he told NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “His agenda, without any question, is on the ballot.”