(Radio Iowa) – Donald Trump won all but five counties in Iowa and Republicans gained seats in the Iowa legislature in this week’s election. Iowa Democratic Party chair Rita Hart has issued a written statement, calling the results “an absolute gut punch.”

University of Northern Iowa political science professor Christopher Larimer said it shows the urban-rural divide in Iowa continues to expand and the shift toward Republican candidates for the legislature that began in 2010 continues. “The turnout rates have been relatively the same over those same election cycles, so it’s not like the electorate’s expanding a lot or contracting a lot,” Larimer said. “At least the overall numbers seem to be staying the same and obviously new people come in and vote, but we’re seeing a further shift to the right.”

Matt Paul, a former aide to Tom Vilsack, ran Tom Harkin’s last U-S Senate campaign, worked on Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign and is now a consultant. He said Democrats have a “profound” messaging problem. “We need to go back to the drawing board as a party and rebuild the party,” Paul said today during taping of “Iowa Press” which airs this evening on Iowa PBS.

Paul cited data heading into the election showing 65% to 70% of Americans thought the country was headed in the wrong direction and he said the election results show Democrats need to rethink how they talk about the economic issues Americans face on a daily basis.

Former Vilsack aide Matt Paull, on left, and former Branstad aide Jimmy Centers on the Iowa Press set on Nov. 8, 2024.. (Iowa PBS photo)

“Especially in a presidential race, right? They are pocketbook elections and we missed the pocketbook completely,” Paul said. “…It’s already begun — a lot of bloviating about what happened and everyone thinks they want to fix it on the Democratic side, especially in the consultancy orbit…because if we take the same approach, if we take the same path, we will not see electoral success in the future.”

Jimmy Centers, who was a spokesman for Governor Terry Branstad, has worked on local, state and presidential campaigns and also appears on this week’s “Iowa Press” episode. Centers said he was struck by Trump’s margin of victory in Iowa. “I thought Trump would win,” Centers said. “I didn’t see him winning by as large of a margin as he did and I thought we were going to have some battles, particularly in the urban areas and in the Polk and Dallas County areas fared a lot better for Republicans.”

Trump won Iowa by over 13 points. No presidential candidate in the past half century has won the state by a larger margin.

“You can like or dislike how President-elect Trump speaks, but American voters clearly respond to the direct and frank nature of his remarks. That has been proven in this election,” Centers said. “He’s focusing on issues that are most important to them, from public safety to economic issues, and they give him a pass on this other stuff. It’s part of the brand that he’s built.”

Larimer, who spoke with Radio Iowa by phone, said Biden’s low job approval rating and voter attitudes about the economy in the spring were key indicators of the likely outcome of the presidential race this fall. “The very simple forecasting models in political science say you can look at approval ratings, you look at economic growth in the second quarter of an election year,” Larimer said, “and that tell you a lot about what is going to happen in November.”

And Larimer said the hyper-partisan atmosphere at the national level has accelerated over the past 16 years and that national conversation is also affecting how people view the parties here in Iowa.

Iowa Democratic Party chair Rita Hart sent a memo to the party’s governing board, saying it’s “really hard to envision what is next for Democrats.” She also urged Democrats not to “throw up their hands and give up,: but to prepare for the next election in 2026.