It's going to be a cold night in political hell on Monday...

I was drafting a piece for Liberal Democrat Voice to be published on Monday morning, and I was reminded that there's a pretty brutal weather system in America's Midwest at the moment.

So, I turned on the weather app on my phone and found this...

And that's in Celsius! Yes, on Monday, it's predicted to be no warmer than -19°C (-2°F) in Des Moines, the state capital of Iowa, where the first Republican caucuses are due to take place.

But is it likely to have any major effect?

You might reasonably argue that the more fanatical Republican activists will turn out regardless, but that urban delegates (perhaps more socially liberal) might be more likely to reach their caucus venues. Research published yesterday by the Washington Post suggests that Democrats are more deterred by bad weather than Republicans. But bad weather also depresses risk tolerance amongst voters.

I'm not sure what that means in a Trump/DeSantis/Haley contest. From a European perspective, Trump looks like the risky option, but he is the former President, after all, and so many American voters seem to have decided that Trump is a victim and not a criminal.

So, we'll see if Iowa throws us all a curveball in the early hours on Tuesday morning...