Donald Trump is taking a page from Barack Obama's brilliant 2008 campaign playbook

Donald Trump
(Image credit: Charlie Leight/Getty Images)

If you are inclined to believe that Donald Trump's campaign for president is some meta-reality television show, think again: The Donald is rolling out an impressive ground game in Iowa, whose caucuses in February will be the first presidential primary contest in the nation, reports The Washington Post. As a member of Rick Perry's Iowa team tells the Post, "I see [Trump's campaign] as a major threat to all the other campaigns because of the aggressiveness of their ground game."

The Post notes that Trump is building a large field organization and that his Iowa campaign director, Chuck Laudner, helped lead Rick Santorum to victory there in 2012. But perhaps the most interesting aspect of Trump's strategy comes straight from Barack Obama's successful insurgent campaign in 2008, which involved expanding the pool of voters to include those who hadn't caucused before:

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
Ryu Spaeth

Ryu Spaeth is deputy editor at TheWeek.com. Follow him on Twitter.