WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Tuesday kicked off his midterm campaign schedule in Iowa with a pair of messaging gambles, touting an economy on which many voters have soured and urging farmers to give his global tariffs more time.

Standing behind signage that read “Lower Prices” and “Bigger Paychecks,” Trump didn’t begin the Clive, Iowa, rally by recounting his administration’s efforts to lower prices. Rather, he opened by boasting that the state had sent him on a “rocket ship to the White House” in 2016, then griping about a “rigged election” four years later before referring to the Biden administration as “crooked,” “morons” and a “nightmare.”

Once he got to economic matters, Trump blamed his predecessor for the country’s ongoing economic malaise. “Twelve months ago, Joe Biden handed us a mess. We inherited the legacy of record-high inflation,” he said to applause. A half hour later, he touted higher wages under his watch, as well as lower prices for airfare, hotels, car payments and some grocery items.

“But today, just after one year of President Trump, our economy is booming, incomes are rising, investment is soaring, inflation has been defeated,” he said to more tepid cheers. But he got a bigger bump from the crowd when he said he was leading “an amazing turnaround, and all because we have a president who does something very simple: puts America first.”

Trump was interrupted several times by hecklers Tuesday, and he credited law enforcement for quickly removing them from the hall.

Even before he took the stage, the president warned that should Democrats take the House after November’s elections, he would be impeached for a third time.

“They’ll find something. There’ll be something. I made the wrong turn on an exit, and let’s impeach him,” he told Fox News in Urbanville. “Now, they did that before. They impeached me on a perfect phone call. They impeached me twice — and by the way, I won the impeachments very easily and quickly.”

A Jan. 23-26 Economist/YouGov survey put disapproval of Trump’s job performance among Americans at 57%, while 39% approved. A Jan. 23-25 Reuters-Ipsos poll revealed similar findings, with 59% of U.S. adults disapproving and 38% approving.

Here are three takeaways from Trump’s first midterm campaign tour stop of 2026.

Midterm ‘Macho Man’

Several congressional races in the Hawkeye State are shaping up to be competitive this year, including the contests for the 1st District, represented by Republican Mariannette Miller-Meeks, as well as GOP Rep. Zach Nunn’s 3rd District. Democrats are also targeting the open 2nd District and have a contested primary in the race to succeed retiring GOP Sen. Joni Ernst, which could be key to their hopes of flipping the Senate. All races are rated as competitive by Inside Elections with Nathan L. Gonzales.

Iowa, once a presidential battleground, has moved sharply to the right in the Trump era. But state Democrats are approaching the midterms with guarded optimism, citing the negative impact of Trump’s tariff policy on the state’s all-important agriculture sector and anxiety about the economy in general as the main factors fueling their confidence. The party is hopeful this will finally be the year that Miller-Meeks is dislodged from her battleground district in eastern Iowa. A veteran of a couple of exceptionally close elections, the congresswoman will face Democrat Christina Bohannan, whom she defeated by 799 votes in 2024.

Miller-Meeks was among those who spoke Tuesday before Trump hit the stage. “They’re playing this song, ‘Macho Man,’” she said of the 1978 disco anthem by the Village People. “Every hardworking woman deserves a macho man. And I see a whole lot of it all around me. But the No. 1 macho man, you’re gonna hear from in a little while.”

Republican candidates are hoping Trump is just that come November and can help their candidates in close races.

The Economist/YouGov survey found 60% of Americans saying the country was on the wrong track, compared with 31% who said it was headed in the right direction. And the Reuters-Ipsos poll showed most Americans, 56%, disapproved of Trump’s economic stewardship, while 35% approved.

Minnesota: ‘Don’t think it’s a pullback’

During a gaggle with reporters and then at the live Fox News interview at his first stop in Iowa, Trump shrugged off changes he ordered to senior immigration enforcement personnel in Minnesota, which has been rocked by deadly protests over the administration’s immigration enforcement.

“I do that all the time. I shake up teams. Everybody here, these are a lot of owners of farms and places, and you shake up your team (if) they can’t do the crops fast enough,” he told reporters at The Machine Shed restaurant in Urbandale.

“I don’t think it’s a pullback. It’s a little bit of a change,” Trump told Fox News during a live interview at the eatery.

About Greg Bovino, the former Customs and Border Patrol commander at large who had been in the lead on the ground in Minnesota until Monday night, Trump said, “Bovino is very good, but he’s a pretty out there kind of a guy. And in some cases, that’s good. Maybe it wasn’t good here.”

Trump again broke with some Second Amendment absolutists in his party by stating flatly that Alex Pretti, who was shot and killed by an immigration officer in Minneapolis, didn’t have a right to be at Saturday’s protest armed.

“Everybody in this room, we view that as a very unfortunate incident. Everyone, unless you’re a stupid person. A very, very unfortunate incident,” he told reporters. “He had a gun. I don’t like that.”

Tariffs: Deere tracks

Trump looked away from Fox News host Will Cain at his first stop and pleaded with farmers seated at The Machine Shed restaurant for more time to allow his tariffs to take their full effect.

Once onstage in Clive, he contended that the import fees were “starting to kick in now for the farmers.” Further, he claimed the tariffs have been the catalyst for “the most dramatic one-year turnaround of any country in history, in terms of the speed.”

“I really thought it would take us two or three years to do what we’re doing,” he said of the economy. “The greatest, the No. 1 country anywhere in history, in the world, anywhere in history, for investment coming into the country. And it’s amazing, and it’s because of tariffs.”

The Trump administration in December announced a $12 billion aid package for U.S. farmers hit hardest by his global tariffs. Agricultural machinery giant John Deere laid off 141 workers at plants in Des Moines and Waterloo. Construction equipment manufacturer Case New Holland let go 200 workers at a Burlington facility.

Trump on Tuesday touted John Deere’s stock price and plans to erect a $70 million facility in North Carolina, one of Iowa’s agricultural competitors. The Tar Heel state factory, he boasted, would be “brand new” and “the best in the world.”

“I think it’s going to pay off very, very big,” he said of the Deere plant. “And if it doesn’t, I had nothing to do with this,” he quipped. “But if it does, I’m going ... to take full credit.”

He did tout his administration’s efforts to crank up U.S. ethanol exports, getting a modest pop from the crowd as he noted it would help Iowa’s economy.

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(Daniela Altimari contributed to this report.)

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